# DTivo on UPS rebooting in storms.



## akaye (Jan 3, 2004)

Hello. I have two Dtivos, both plugged into the same UPS, and both hooked to the same indoor multi-switch, two cables to each unit.

During electrical storms this season, one and only one of the units will stutter, freeze and reboot itself (just once per storm, maybe because storms don't last long around here). The other always stays rock solid.

Next time, I will swap both cables to see if the problem follows the cables or the unit, but assuming it follows the unit, what could it be? Any ideas? Is it likely sign of a dying box? Bad drive? Or just a minor inconvenient electrical oddity that I can safely ignore?

If it follows the cables, can I just assume bad switch?

Thanks!


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## JimSpence (Sep 19, 2001)

Are you sure that both units are connected to the battery backup section on the UPS. Most UPSs have both battery backup and surge outlets. 

Another test would be to swap the outlets that the TiVos are connected to on the UPS. There may be a bad outlet.


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## rock_doctor (Oct 22, 2000)

There are many cases where tivo's with 6.4a will reboot during rain fade events. I have seen mine do it a couple of times.


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## stevel (Aug 23, 2000)

Yep - I've seen this (reboot with rain fade) too.


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## akaye (Jan 3, 2004)

Interesting.
Yes, both are on back up, and if I pull the plug, or if there is a non-weather-related power event, nothing is amiss, so I'm confident the UPS is ok.

Weird about reboots with rain fade...why would that be?
I was suspecting some sort of stray current on one of the signal cables, but you guys think some effect of the signal loss itself could cause it?

And both of them are on 6.4a...wonder why the problem only happens on one? BTW, one is an R10 and the other is an RCA...um...can't recall which one has the problem....but it's always the same one....


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## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

You will also need something to attenuate from lightning of the cable coming in from the street and harming the equipment. Not all UPS are the same, most will just go to battery if there is a problem in the power line, and others can tend to the power when it dips down (brownouts). Brownouts, surges and spikes can harm equipment. Blackout may not harm as much but its the surge when the power comes back up that can be harmful.


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## stevel (Aug 23, 2000)

I suspect a bug in the software that has a problem when the signal gets bad.


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## dtremain (Jan 5, 2004)

stevel said:


> Yep - I've seen this (reboot with rain fade) too.


Yup. One of mine, a Samsung 100 hr. unit does it. The other, an R-10, does not. Both are on 6.4a and both are completely unhacked and unmodified. Both, by the way, are on surge protectors,, but not ups.


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## stevel (Aug 23, 2000)

I have an HR10-250 and a HR21-700, both on a 1500VA UPS. Since 6.4a, the HR10 will freeze or reboot in a thunderstorm. The HR21 does not.


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## akaye (Jan 3, 2004)

This problem has gotten worse. The RCA will reboot, or worse, completely freeze, during storms. At some point I swapped sat cables between the R10 and the RCA and verified that the issue is with the RCA.

Do any of you think removing and running Spinrite on the drive would be worth the time and effort, or is there some consensus that, as stevel says, it's a software issue?

I'm trying to make this system last until the reported new HD DTivo comes out, but the last lock up almost made us miss the new Dr. Who, and I don't need that kind of stress in what is supposed to be my stress-relieving TV watching activities! 

Thanks!


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## stevel (Aug 23, 2000)

It's not a hard drive issue, I'm certain. Haven't seen the problem myself in a while, though.


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## Duffycoug (Feb 12, 2007)

Wow am I glad I came across this thread....two of my units (both with 6.4a) have been rebooting during rain fade....I have directv coming out to realign my dish cause my numbers are low on 99 and 103, rock solid on the others....so hopefully that will help? Anyway, not much to add except that both of mine reboot during rain fade, thought it might be my drives going, too, glad to hear it's not.


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## Duffycoug (Feb 12, 2007)

Well, they came out and realigned dish WITHOUT a signal meter...but the signal were 95+ on every sats, including both HDs.....having a HUGE and i mean HUGE thunderstorm right now.....numbers still over 90 on all 3 basic sats, 70-75 on the two HD sats.....picture is fine.....good stuff.


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## dtremain (Jan 5, 2004)

akaye said:


> And both of them are on 6.4a...wonder why the problem only happens on one? BTW, one is an R10 and the other is an RCA...um...can't recall which one has the problem....but it's always the same one....


It would be the RCA. Non-RID units like the RCA (and my Samsung) do that.

I think that it's high time Directv did something to fix it, but I guess they are not concerned.


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## dtremain (Jan 5, 2004)

akaye said:


> Do any of you think removing and running Spinrite on the drive would be worth the time and effort, or is there some consensus that, as stevel says, it's a software issue?


It's a software issue.

I have discovered that, when it freezes, sometimes you do not have to unplug it. If you push the reset button on the unit, it will sometimes bring up the blue TiVo menu and you can go back to live tv (or, I suspect, the list), from there. Sometimes, however, that does not work, and you have to unplug it.

I hope that that's a little help to a lot of people.


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## kaszeta (Jun 11, 2004)

Yup, my DSR-704 reboots under heavy rain fade as well.


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## RedRoc86 (Jul 19, 2009)

One other possible cause to consider. Depending on your UPS and whether it has this setting, you may need to check whether there is a setting for how long of a delay before the UPS returns to line power have an outage.

We have had this problem a couple of times where UPS were not setup correctly, initially (Most have been UPS 1500 SmartUPS models).

If your system reboots or freezes when there is a very quick outage (split second outage) then this could be a possibility.

Here is the senario. If you "return to line power' setting is set to "0" like our misconfigured systems were, then when a quick outage occurs, the UPS switches to battery and then since power has been restored (split second outage) the UPS tries to switch right back to the line supply. The problem is in the switching time. Even though it is fast itself, there is a delay as it switch to battery and there a delay switching to line power. If the power outage is quick and the setting I mention is "0" instead of something like "60" seconds, then those switching delays are back to back and identical equipment plugged into the battery side of the UPS (actually the APC 1500s are all battery outlets) may respond differently. We had four Dell PowerEdge 860 rack mounted servers and while three would stay up, one would crash. 

So the lesson was that identical equipment have different tolerances to these "absence of power" times and one may stay up while another may crash.


While you problem may more likely be related to the "rain fade" as others mention, I thought I would add one possible think to check.


Basically, if your lights flicker during a rain storm and the UPS switches to battery for a split second (you may hear the switching as the relays switch) and the RCA unit you are having the problem with crashes/reboots/freezes, this could be causing it. Your RCA unit is more susceptible to power absences than your other unit.

Additionally, while this might not be the solution to your problem, perhaps someone else might be suffering from this behavior and can benefit.

Good luck.


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## akaye (Jan 3, 2004)

dtremain said:


> It's a software issue.
> 
> I have discovered that, when it freezes, sometimes you do not have to unplug it. If you push the reset button on the unit, it will sometimes bring up the blue TiVo menu and you can go back to live tv (or, I suspect, the list), from there. Sometimes, however, that does not work, and you have to unplug it.
> 
> I hope that that's a little help to a lot of people.


What reset button?

BTW, my RCA has gotten near unusable. Rebooting at the drop of a hat, freezing up frequently.
I've taken it off line and I'm going to try working on the drive...well, just because I have no better ideas.

Anyone got an R10 or similar unit for sale cheap?


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

akaye said:


> What reset button?


Should be a red reset button next to the card slot.
(behind the card slot door of course)

phox


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## akaye (Jan 3, 2004)

phox_mulder said:


> Should be a red reset button next to the card slot.
> (behind the card slot door of course)
> 
> phox


No reset button on my RCA unfortunately. 
My R10 has one, but I had never noticed before since I've never needed it!


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## dtremain (Jan 5, 2004)

akaye said:


> No reset button on my RCA unfortunately.
> My R10 has one, but I had never noticed before since I've never needed it!


On my Samsung, it's actually right on the front panel.

Using it after a rain fade crash has only worked once, by the way.

I've had to unplug every other time.

Fluky stuff, this.


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## akaye (Jan 3, 2004)

I got an R10 via ebay and replaced my RCA.
Had a few scares during initial install, because it appears that I may have a problem with SEVERAL outlets on my UPS...I lost power several times while trying to upgrade and configure the new box, AND my old r10, which has never failed. lost power during the same period. The new box lost power during the 6.4a update and I though I corrupted it. It seemed to be in a reboot loop. But it miraculously healed itself, and it worked flawlessly for the last week.

Last night it froze in a similar manner to my RCA, while my old R10 still has never had that problem, so we are REALLY worried. I mean, it's a whole new device, a different model, on a different outlet, and it has the SAME problem??
I'm crossing my fingers that it was a one-time rain-fade glitch. But we'll see....
I also went out and got a new UPS today, so I'll switch that over tomorrow and see what happens.

AK


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## rbtravis (Aug 9, 2005)

How old are the UPS batteries? They have a service life of about 5 years. After that they should be replaced.


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## stebu (Oct 15, 2002)

Does anybody know if anything is being done about the R10s (and other units) crashing on signal loss? I have two R10s, and they pretty reliably crash on signal loss now.


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## akaye (Jan 3, 2004)

I'm not holding my breath for any future updates to the old DTivos.
Last year we replaced that RCA with a used R10, I checked all the connectors in the line from the dish to the box, tightening and re-crimping where needed, replaced the UPS, and it seems the frequency of reboots has gone down dramatically. Over the past winter/spring storm season, I can only recall it rebooting once, maybe twice, where the previous season with similar weather, it was so frequent it was just about unusable.

We are bracing ourselves for the fact that, while we love our current setup (2 SD DTivos, modulated to all TVs in the house, and everyone down to my seven year old knows how to operate it) we are on the verge of having to replace everything. I'm holding out hope that the new Tivo-based DTV unit becomes a reality and let's us keep our system functionally the same. HD isn't really a priority for us, as we only have one HD set in the house, and we sit far enough away that SD content--even remodulated--looks good enough.


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