# Is there a way to be sure that 4 Flashing Lights is a HDD failure?



## CallMeBob (Jun 15, 2005)

I wrote in another thread that my Bolt+ has the 4 Flashing Lights. I have called Tivo, who has been less than helpful, and wants to sell me an Edge. They are denying my continual care claim because they sent me a defective box when I first bought it and consider the exchange for a working unit to be my replacement under the continual care program, despite the fact that it was the day after I activated the box. A total load of BS. At any rate, I am considering either putting in a new HDD or just moving on from Tivo. The problem is that before I spend money buying an HDD that I can't return, I want to make sure that the flashing lights are, in fact, a drive failure. When I plug the Tivo in, I get a Tivo splash screen, then the lights start to flash and my TV changes to report no signal.

This is the drive that I am considering.

Any help?


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

CallMeBob said:


> This is the drive that I am considering.
> Any help?


That drive has this in its description:
For the 2020 holiday season, returnable items shipped between October 1 and December 31 can be returned until January 31, 2021

That should be long enough to test.


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## brucedelta (Oct 2, 2001)

CallMeBob said:


> I wrote in another thread that my Bolt+ has the 4 Flashing Lights. I have called Tivo, who has been less than helpful, and wants to sell me an Edge. They are denying my continual care claim because they sent me a defective box when I first bought it and consider the exchange for a working unit to be my replacement under the continual care program, despite the fact that it was the day after I activated the box. A total load of BS. At any rate, I am considering either putting in a new HDD or just moving on from Tivo. The problem is that before I spend money buying an HDD that I can't return, I want to make sure that the flashing lights are, in fact, a drive failure. When I plug the Tivo in, I get a Tivo splash screen, then the lights start to flash and my TV changes to report no signal.
> 
> This is the drive that I am considering.
> 
> Any help?


My Bolt had 4 flashing lights one day almost 2 weeks ago. I am still waiting for the Tivo replacement Edge and my experience with Tivo support was as bad as yours except hey were willing to sell me the Edge replacement for $149. Since everyone talks about Bolt heat problems I figured I would do that over replace the drive. I did consider replacing the drive and the conclusion I came to was to buy the one you linked to as it seems to be compatible. If I do not have a working Edge by Monday I will be ordering that drive and skipping the Edge.


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## shwru980r (Jun 22, 2008)

CallMeBob said:


> I wrote in another thread that my Bolt+ has the 4 Flashing Lights. I have called Tivo, who has been less than helpful, and wants to sell me an Edge. They are denying my continual care claim because they sent me a defective box when I first bought it and consider the exchange for a working unit to be my replacement under the continual care program, despite the fact that it was the day after I activated the box. A total load of BS. At any rate, I am considering either putting in a new HDD or just moving on from Tivo. The problem is that before I spend money buying an HDD that I can't return, I want to make sure that the flashing lights are, in fact, a drive failure. When I plug the Tivo in, I get a Tivo splash screen, then the lights start to flash and my TV changes to report no signal.
> 
> This is the drive that I am considering.
> 
> Any help?


You could buy a cheap bolt without service on ebay and verify it works then swap the power supply and then the hard drive with your tivo. You could return the ebay bolt if it doesn't fix your bolt.


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## tommage1 (Nov 6, 2008)

CallMeBob said:


> I wrote in another thread that my Bolt+ has the 4 Flashing Lights. I have called Tivo, who has been less than helpful, and wants to sell me an Edge. They are denying my continual care claim because they sent me a defective box when I first bought it and consider the exchange for a working unit to be my replacement under the continual care program, despite the fact that it was the day after I activated the box. A total load of BS. At any rate, I am considering either putting in a new HDD or just moving on from Tivo. The problem is that before I spend money buying an HDD that I can't return, I want to make sure that the flashing lights are, in fact, a drive failure. When I plug the Tivo in, I get a Tivo splash screen, then the lights start to flash and my TV changes to report no signal.
> 
> This is the drive that I am considering.
> 
> Any help?


Check your conversations. And yes, that drive should work if the drive is the issue.


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## overFEDEXed (Nov 11, 2002)

CallMeBob said:


> I wrote in another thread that my Bolt+ has the 4 Flashing Lights. I have called Tivo, who has been less than helpful, and wants to sell me an Edge. They are denying my continual care claim because they sent me a defective box when I first bought it and consider the exchange for a working unit to be my replacement under the continual care program, despite the fact that it was the day after I activated the box. A total load of BS. At any rate, I am considering either putting in a new HDD or just moving on from Tivo. The problem is that before I spend money buying an HDD that I can't return, I want to make sure that the flashing lights are, in fact, a drive failure. When I plug the Tivo in, I get a Tivo splash screen, then the lights start to flash and my TV changes to report no signal.
> 
> This is the drive that I am considering.
> 
> Any help?


I had the same exact Bolt "four lights" issue too. TiVo sent me a new Edge Cable 2Tb today in fact, for $250. I'm keeping my Bolt+ and I ordered that exact drive to put in it.
50% restocking fee along with shipping, so you might as well say "No refunds". Only $60 though and I'll probably sell the + when I get the drive on Wednesday so....


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## CallMeBob (Jun 15, 2005)

> I had the same exact Bolt "four lights" issue too. TiVo sent me a new Edge Cable 2Tb today in fact, for $250. I'm keeping my Bolt+ and I ordered that exact drive to put in it.
> 50% restocking fee along with shipping, so you might as well say "No refunds". Only $60 though and I'll probably sell the + when I get the drive on Wednesday so....


I'm thinking of just going with the Edge. I'm going to try to get a bit better offer, but after looking into other options, even Youtube TV, I just can't find anything as cheap as the package I'm getting from Fios. I do like the idea of buying the drive and selling the Bolt as I've always been unhappy with the loud fan and if the Edge is quieter, as I've read, that is certainly a plus. I don't always watch TV through my receiver with the volume up and when the volume on the TV is low, you can really hear the Bolt even sitting 20'+ away.


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## ajwees41 (May 7, 2006)

brucedelta said:


> My Bolt had 4 flashing lights one day almost 2 weeks ago. I am still waiting for the Tivo replacement Edge and my experience with Tivo support was as bad as yours except hey were willing to sell me the Edge replacement for $149. Since everyone talks about Bolt heat problems I figured I would do that over replace the drive. I did consider replacing the drive and the conclusion I came to was to buy the one you linked to as it seems to be compatible. If I do not have a working Edge by Monday I will be ordering that drive and skipping the Edge.


did they say they would send the replacement before you sent the defective one?


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## brucedelta (Oct 2, 2001)

ajwees41 said:


> did they say they would send the replacement before you sent the defective one?


They did and charged me a deposit of $499 + tax to be refunded when I return the Bolt. At the time I wrote the original post they had sent me the Edge box but no power supply and the Bolt PS is not compatible. Support said they would send the PS 2 day but it went first class so took a while to get here. I now have a working Edge, but the entire ordeal dealing with Tivo was very unpleasant.


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## pldoolittle (May 2, 2002)

I got 4 flashing lights last night. I just tossed in an old 250GB WD Scorpio Blue I had laying around. It's running guided setup now.

Interestingly, I put the Bolt HDD in my workstation and it formatted fine and is currently undergoing a bad block check. Could this be a SMART threshold failure and not an actual HDD failure?

Also, I tried an HGST 750GB (HTB-TS5SAD750) and it immediately went to 4 flashing lights. Any clue why?

Note: We only use TiVo for a few OTA recordings these days, and that's so little it's hardly worth $12/mo. Easier to pick up Hulu and get them that way. If this drive doesn't work out, I'm not spending any more money on TiVo (DVR or Streamers). I probably WOULD if either A) the TiVo minis ran the same apps as a stream 4k or B) the TiVo Stream 4K would stream from the TiVo DVR. Either A or B would make us an all TiVo house again. Sigh....


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## pldoolittle (May 2, 2002)

UPDATE: Just finished guided setup. Apparently the geniuses at TiVo thought it was best to upload the new (non-existent) seasons passes from the reformatted drive to TiVo online, overwriting the passes that were there pre-setup. As a result, ALL our seasons passes have been lost forever. Some of those will be easy to remember and re-create, while others are for shows that are on long hiatus.

It was a good run (20 years), but at this point I see no reason to put anymore time or money into maintaining TiVo any devices.


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## UCLABB (May 29, 2012)

pldoolittle said:


> UPDATE: Just finished guided setup. Apparently the geniuses at TiVo thought it was best to upload the new (non-existent) seasons passes from the reformatted drive to TiVo online, overwriting the passes that were there pre-setup. As a result, ALL our seasons passes have been lost forever. Some of those will be easy to remember and re-create, while others are for shows that are on long hiatus.
> 
> It was a good run (20 years), but at this point I see no reason to put anymore time or money into maintaining TiVo any devices.


Lesson here is to save season passes to KMTTG periodically.


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## spammsmcghee (Feb 19, 2010)

shwru980r said:


> You could buy a cheap bolt without service on ebay and verify it works then swap the power supply and then the hard drive with your tivo. You could return the ebay bolt if it doesn't fix your bolt.


Is there a guide on this? This is exactly what I was wondering about when I came to visit the forum today.


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## pldoolittle (May 2, 2002)

I'm not convinced this was an HDD failure. I removed the HDD, formatted it in windows, and did a check for errors. Only three blocks marked bad. Drive test good on intensive read/write tests.

Tonight (on the new HDD) I was attempting to perform a channel scan and received the "This setting will not be available until after a software update is installed later tonight." error. I forced a restart and on boot, 4 flashing lights.

I power cycled and have restarted multiple times. It WILL NOT install the update. It's had 10 days since guided setup to update on it's own.


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## ajwees41 (May 7, 2006)

pldoolittle said:


> I'm not convinced this was an HDD failure. I removed the HDD, formatted it in windows, and did a check for errors. Only three blocks marked bad. Drive test good on intensive read/write tests.
> 
> Tonight (on the new HDD) I was attempting to perform a channel scan and received the "This setting will not be available until after a software update is installed later tonight." error. I forced a restart and on boot, 4 flashing lights.
> 
> I power cycled and have restarted multiple times. It WILL NOT install the update. It's had 10 days since guided setup to update on it's own.


does it say pending restart in network area? clear and delete to marry the drive to the tivo


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## pldoolittle (May 2, 2002)

ajwees41 said:


> does it say pending restart in network area? clear and delete to marry the drive to the tivo


If I started with a blank drive, waited forever for TiVO to boot and setup, then ran guided setup, I still need to clear and delete?


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## kpeters59 (Jun 19, 2007)

No.

Is something not working?

-KP


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## pldoolittle (May 2, 2002)

Yes. After many weeks, and many reboots, it still says: 

"This setting will not be available until after a software update is installed later tonight." 

I got tired of screwing with it. Plus this is the second dead bolt in 2.25 years. I dumped the Bolt and resurrected the old Roamio.


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## kpeters59 (Jun 19, 2007)

Did you try a KS57?

Or a KS76543210 ?

-KP


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## pldoolittle (May 2, 2002)

Nope.


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## kpeters59 (Jun 19, 2007)

If I were you, I'd consider trying that.

-KP


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## tommage1 (Nov 6, 2008)

pldoolittle said:


> UPDATE: Just finished guided setup. Apparently the geniuses at TiVo thought it was best to upload the new (non-existent) seasons passes from the reformatted drive to TiVo online, overwriting the passes that were there pre-setup. As a result, ALL our seasons passes have been lost forever. Some of those will be easy to remember and re-create, while others are for shows that are on long hiatus.


No, there are two "drives" in the Bolt, the hard drive and flash memory. A lot is on the flash drive. When you put the new drive in some of what was on the flash drive kinda transferred to the new drive I guess. Do what others suggested, run the kick start 76543210. And/or zero out the new drives you are trying. Also check the drives you had sitting around for errors. Once you put another drive everything on your original is lost anyway, the map to the recordings is on the flash drive, when you put in new drive the map altered to the new drive, map to old drive is gone.


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## tommage1 (Nov 6, 2008)

kpeters59 said:


> If I were you, I'd consider trying that.
> 
> -KP


Also you need to be sure the 500 and 750 are CMR drives. I think most 2.5" under 1TB are CMR. But maybe yours are not. There is also a chance your original issue was caused by a failing power supply/AC adapter. They can go partially bad, enough to power up but not enough to boot the drive properly. If you have a spare 12v 3A supply sitting around with the correct polarity could give it a try. The 3 bad sectors, depends on where they are. One bad sector could cause a drive not to boot, depending on where the bad sector is.


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