# Season Pass problem



## Dan29 (Jul 2, 2006)

Hi all

First post here and couldn't find anything about this problem by searching so any help appreciated please.

Despite having up-to-date programme guide data, my TiVo is failing to recognise that programmes for which I've set season passes are scheduled.

e.g. Big Brother is in the Channel 4 listings for tonight, but in the To Do list it shows as None Scheduled. Pressing Record and then selecting Season Pass and Other Options gives the option "Record this episode also" - so it knows that there is a season pass for the programme, in which case why is it saying None Scheduled?

In the next week only about 6 of my season passes have made it to the To Do list.

This happened a few months ago and running guided setup seemed to sort it out, until now. 

I guess if it was just corrupted guide data then another dial-up would sort it out? I'm worried it's something more serious like a HD or PSU problem, but how would running guided setup fix it, only for it to mess up again?

Sorry for rambling - thanks in advance for any help you can provide.
Dan


----------



## lenwuk (Oct 3, 2004)

Have you tried checking the "View Recording History" in the "To Do List"?
There's usually a reason given why it didn't/won't record something, even if it IS a bit debatable sometimes.

Regards, Len


----------



## Dan29 (Jul 2, 2006)

lenwuk said:


> Have you tried checking the "View Recording History" in the "To Do List"?
> There's usually a reason given why it didn't/won't record something, even if it IS a bit debatable sometimes.
> 
> Regards, Len


Thanks for replying Len.

The only items in the View Recording History list are multiple occurances of the 6 or so season passes the TiVo IS recognising.

So to continue using Big Brother as a (slightly embarrassing) example, it's in the Season Pass list, it's in the programme guide, but in the To Do list it says "None Scheduled" and so it doesn't appear at all in "View Recording History" because the TiVo isn't making the link between the event in the listings and the season pass - even though if I then go into it via the listings it gives me the option to "Record this episode also" 

Cheers
Dan


----------



## RWILTS (Apr 21, 2006)

I am having no problems with my BB season pass (for the wife!!) but there was another thread that stated that the BB metadata tags could be erratic and could result in poor performance. Although obviously not from my own experience. 

So have you tried re requesting the SP for BB from another listed episode in case the one you originaly selected had duff info ?


----------



## Dan29 (Jul 2, 2006)

Could be, but it's doing the same for loads of other season passes (approx 30 since running guided setup last time and losing my previous season passes) - for some reason there are 5 or 6 that still seem to be working correctly though. 

Thanks
Dan (also in Cardiff )

EDIT: Cancelling the season pass for BB and re-setting it has apparently fixed the problem for that programme. However I don't fancy doing this for every season pass, every couple of months!

Am only dialling up for guide data once a week at the moment - surely that shouldn't corrupt any data or confuse the TiVo?


----------



## The Obo (Feb 22, 2005)

Dan29 said:


> Am only dialling up for guide data once a week at the moment - surely that shouldn't corrupt any data or confuse the TiVo?


Is your TiVo more than half full of "keep until I delete" programs?
I often find that when my TiVo is nearly full of KUID programs then TiVo won't schedule any records more than 1 or 2 days in advance, and if you're only dialling up once a week then this could make things worse (because TiVo only reschedules ercordings after a successful dial-up I think)

This wouldn't explain why they are not in the Recording History though...


----------



## Dan29 (Jul 2, 2006)

It was full of programmes until I watched a load last night, but no KUID at all.

It hasn't been recording any Suggestions recently either, even when there has been enough space free. Not sure whether this is connected or not.


----------



## RWILTS (Apr 21, 2006)

Just something else to add,

I belive that you can run a guided set up without deleting your season passes( i think) save you setting them up all of them up again if you decide to go down that route again.


----------



## Dan29 (Jul 2, 2006)

Thanks for that. Last night I deleted most of the season passes and re-requested them, which seemed to fix the problem for each one. However this will probably not be a permanent solution, and it's annoying not knowing why this keeps happening and whether it's a sign of something more serious about to go wrong..!

Thanks again for all the help so far
Dan


----------



## patelr08 (Feb 18, 2002)

I'm seeing similar behaviour with my Lost season pass. Could it be related the fact that there are multiple episodes across multiple channels?

I deleted the current season pass, added it again using the C4 episodes and then made it No1 in the list of season passes. When i look at forthcoming episodes, none are scheduled to be recorded.


----------



## Ian_m (Jan 9, 2001)

patelr08 said:


> I deleted the current season pass, added it again using the C4 episodes and then made it No1 in the list of season passes. When i look at forthcoming episodes, none are scheduled to be recorded.


I am seeing the same, it just that the TiVo is recording them a week earlier on E4, so no need to record any from C4.


----------



## mhalver (Nov 3, 2005)

I've had some problems with season passes scheduling too much lately (repeats of episodes). I think it may be that they are less careful on adding the "new/repeat" tags (however those are actually done) to shows over the summer.


----------



## pscsuk (Jul 21, 2004)

I'm having exactly the same problem as Dan

It seems to affect the terrestrial channels and related channels (eg BBC1, 2, 3, 4, Itv1,2 etc)

What happens is that I do a guided setup, and it then works fine, for the days that the guided setup downloaded. Any later downloads appear if I look at the particular day, but not in the season passes or 'upcoming episodes' for a series. So I can pick them one at a time to record, but things like BB or Neighbours (for my wife) won't record automatically unless I schedule each episode..

I rang Tivo support (AKA Sky) who sounded like they'd never actually seen a TiVo, but said I should do a full reset (back to factory defaults, losing everything). I obviously didn't want to do this, so I did a guided setup, which worked for a while. I've since done a guided setup every two weeks for the past 6 weeks or so.

Last time, I'd got fed up, so I did do a full reset, losing 50+ hours of recordings I hadn't watched yet - but now, two weeks later, the same problem has occurred  

I don't know what to do. I don't know if it's a problem with the TiVo (I may put back in the original HDD to see if that fixes it) or the EPG data it's downloading.

(A paranoid could think that it's Sky sabotaging things to get me to buy a Sky+ box..)


----------



## Dan29 (Jul 2, 2006)

I deleted most of my season passes and re-booked them which seems to be working, for now. I guess the problem will occur again in a week or so. Would be interested to know if you find out what's causing it!!

Thanks
Dan


----------



## pscsuk (Jul 21, 2004)

I have a couple of things I'm planning to try:
- I have a 'CacheCard' in the TiVo. It was running for a year or two without any RAM in it, but recently I put 512MB RAM into it. I don't think the timing is exactly related, but I wonder if that's corrupting the data somehow. So, I'm going to try:
a) upgrade to the latest drivers for that,
if that doesn't work,
b) taking the RAM out to see if that fixes it (it becomes really slow to use then though)

- if that doesn't work, then I'm going to try a new HDD made from the original TiVo disk

If none of those work, then I'm a bit stumped..


----------



## FJSRiDER (Jan 4, 2003)

I have just had the same problem. The wife has a season pass for 'The Wright Stuff' (Yeah I know, but is is what a TiVo is for!) this has been recording fine as a season pass for ages but must have disappeared over the w/end as it didn't record yesterday or say that it was going to record today. I got the same 'record this programme also' when I set it to record manually. The season pass existed when I looked. I deleted it and reset it but the problem remains.

I seem to remember something like this happened before a year or so ago but can't remember what I did to get it back.


----------



## qb_fox (Jul 10, 2006)

Still on going for me too. 

Anyone actually reach a solution??


----------



## pscsuk (Jul 21, 2004)

Hmm, the fact that this is happening to more than a couple of people suggests either we're using a mod/hack in common, or it's a problem with the data being downloaded.

Is everyone with the problem using a Cachecard?


----------



## FJSRiDER (Jan 4, 2003)

pscsuk said:


> Hmm, the fact that this is happening to more than a couple of people suggests either we're using a mod/hack in common, or it's a problem with the data being downloaded.
> 
> Is everyone with the problem using a Cachecard?


Nope, mine is standard (other than a 120gb disk upgrade that I did a couple of years ago).


----------



## furybball (Mar 17, 2005)

I have had the exact same problem. BUT, i have had no upgrades performed on mine at all. Its annoying to find out a Season Pass hasn't recorded, but like was said before, a simple delete season pass and a new create seems to kick it back into order !

Andy


----------



## furybball (Mar 17, 2005)

I guess the fact that i haven't had any upgrade it must be a problem with the downloaded data !


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

I now seem to have this problem.

Countryfile, for which I have a season pass, did not record this morning. Unfortunately I did not spot in dailymail that it was not listed. 

When I go to my season pass, it says there are no upcoming episodes. If I Search By Title, Countryfile is not listed. However I can Record By Time  the next programme is Sunday 8 April at 11.40 and Countryfile is listed. When I select it, it says This episode will not be recorded, though I can Record this episode also.

My guide data exists through 21 April. 

Looking at my To Do list, all season pass programmes say None Scheduled. Recording History does not contain anything relevant.

Did anyone find a cause/solution for this problem?


----------



## cwaring (Feb 12, 2002)

Possibly a corrupt database issue. If I remember correctly, the only solution is to re-do Guided Setup with a completely different postcode then do it again with the correct (ie your actual) postcode.

I'm sure someone will confirm shortly if I'm correct


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

cwaring said:


> Possibly a corrupt database issue. If I remember correctly, the only solution is to re-do Guided Setup with a completely different postcode then do it again with the correct (ie your actual) postcode.
> 
> I'm sure someone will confirm shortly if I'm correct


I've now carried this out and got my data back - season passes appear back to normal. I'll keep my eye on it in case it happens again.

Thanks, Carl.


----------



## cwaring (Feb 12, 2002)

You're welcome! Glad I could help; and was right


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

greenkr said:


> I've now carried this out and got my data back - season passes appear back to normal. I'll keep my eye on it in case it happens again.
> 
> Thanks, Carl.


Unfortunately I appear to have corrupted data again. I was away last week and when I returned on Sunday thought it was working OK. It had recorded the Grand Prix and Gray's Anatomy on Sunday, and also recorded The Gadget Show on Monday for example. However I have just realised some season pass items have not been recorded - the first missed programme was Spiral episode 6 on Saturday. Although todays dailymail said the daily call had been made successfully and guide data exists through 7 May, when I go to Pick Programmes to Record, there is a message that Only 7 days of Programme Guide data remains. Please make a daily call.

Season Passes show no upcoming episodes.

Last time I did a Guided Setup for another postcode, then re-did it for my postcode. Any other suggestions please?


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

I have now tried the following- first I Cleared Programme Data and To Do List and then made a daily call; this resulted in two warnings, one overlaid on top of the other  "Organising Programme Guide data. Pick programmes to Record will be available in 4-8 hours", and "No programme Guide data remains. Please make a daily call." I waited more than 8 hours but the messages remained. 

Next I ran Guided Setup for another postcode, rebooted and powered off twice, Cleared Programme Data, then ran Guided Setup for my postcode. I was then able to set up some season passes.

However when I try to set up a season pass for Countryfile (next programme Sun 29 May 11am), with Search by Title Countryfile is not listed. If I go to Record by Time or Channel - Browse by Time there is no programme at 11am for BBC1. With Browse by Channel Countryfile is there but if I try to set a season pass I am told The Recorder is unable to set up a season pass for this programme. Some information about this programme is still being organised. Try again in 1-3 hours.

So it appears that my data corruption problem is ongoing. I suppose the next step is to Clear and Delete Everything and try the Guided Setup process again. What do I do if this does not work? I would be grateful for any suggestions.


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

How long did you wait? Indexing the database takes hours.


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

TCM2007 said:


> How long did you wait? Indexing the database takes hours.


More than 24 hours


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Do you have an upgraded hard disk?


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

TCM2007 said:


> Do you have an upgraded hard disk?


Yes, 120gb - had it for a long time.

Still the same problem with the Countryfile season pass (... wait 1-3 hours). It seems to be Sunday am to Monday am that is affected on BBC1 BBC2 and ITV. C4, 5 and ITV2 are OK (haven't tried any more channels).

It was Sunday morning when I reran Guided Setup.


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

Latest instalment: I Cleared and Deleted Everything on Wednesday. At first it seemed OK - I set up season passes again, and they appeared to work correctly  but all is not right. For example the Casualty Season Pass recorded this evenings episode but now says there are no upcoming episodes  it does not seem to know about next Saturdays episode  in spite of the fact that dailymail reports that guide data exists through 17 May.

All I can think of now is to restore the backup I made when I upgraded the Tivo harddrive. 

Unless anyone has any other suggestions?


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Is next Saturday's Casualty in your guide data - suggest you check manually.

It is on mine.


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

TCM2007 said:


> Is next Saturday's Casualty in your guide data - suggest you check manually.
> 
> It is on mine.


Search by Title - Casualty not listed.
Browse by Time - Casualty not listed (nb data listed out of order - eg 8.30pm 14 Friends / 80 Click / then 8.15pm 6 Neighbourhoods... then 9.00pm 11 Vroom Vroom etc).
Browse by Channel - 8.45pm Casualty is listed - says this episode will not be recorded - though nothing else scheduled.


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

> Browse by Channel - 8.45pm Casualty is listed - says this episode will not be recorded - though nothing else scheduled.

Go to the To Do List and find the episode, where it should give more details on why it's not being recorded.


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

TCM2007 said:


> > Browse by Channel - 8.45pm Casualty is listed - says this episode will not be recorded - though nothing else scheduled.
> 
> Go to the To Do List and find the episode, where it should give more details on why it's not being recorded.


For the Casualty Season Pass it says None Scheduled.


----------



## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

Is the season pass a wishlist one?

Anyone checked for an orphaned series (or whatever the phrase is meaning an episode that doesn't get linked into a series)


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

ColinYounger said:


> Is the season pass a wishlist one?


No, just a normal season pass.


----------



## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

OK - just a thought. Sorry for intruding.


----------



## cwaring (Feb 12, 2002)

ColinYounger said:


> Anyone checked for an orphaned series..


Yes and it isn't


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

I have now restored my Tivo backup - and spent some time getting my hacks working again! Season passes seem to be OK though my Countryfile one is showing only one upcoming episode - 6 May - whereas Digiguide says there is one on the 13th as well. How far ahead does Tivo get data? Guide data exists through 19 May.


----------



## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

There's a guide data checker module for Tivoweb that you can get that shows you what data exists for various channels as they supply varying quantities of data. The main channels supply only about 2 weeks maximum once a week, which whittles down to just over a week between updates.

So for example, my BBC1 data exists up to 12th May. That won't change until this Saturday's update.

[EDIT] I tried to search for the module, but couldn't find it - Carl gave me the link. Search for 'Guide Data Check TiVo' or similar


----------



## cwaring (Feb 12, 2002)

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=3074249


----------



## smokie (Dec 27, 2002)

Will watch this thread with interest as I had something similar after recent upgrade to new drive.


----------



## greenkr (Feb 27, 2004)

So far I have rerun Guided Setup, deleted all data, rerun Guided Setup with a different postcode, Cleared Everything, and finally restored from a backup from 2003 (when I installed my hard drive, a Samsung 120gb). Unfortunately I still appear to have data corruption problems leading to season passes not working.

An example - Countryfile season pass says there is one upcoming episode (6/5). Search by Title agrees. Browse by Channel has Countryfile at 11am on 13/5. However Browse by Time does not list it  the first entry at 11am is Mrs Beatons Flying Picnic on 11. As well as Countryfile there should also be Build A New Life in the Country on 5, according to Digiguide. Looking on the next screen down from 11am, it gives 12pm The Politics Show on 1, then 11.30am Inside Sport on 2, then 12pm Formula 1 on 3, then 9.40am Hollyoaks Omnibus on 4. Scrolling down there are many more cases where the data is out of chronological order.

Another example is that it does not have Greys Anatomy tomorrow in the To Do List (it says None Scheduled in the season pass), though it is listed in the Browse by Time list at 8pm and 9pm (this episode will not be recorded).

Should I now assume that the hard drive is faulty? Is there a way of testing it beyond SMART (I have hdparm -c1 -d1 -m16 -S0 /dev/hda via Startup Editor and No SMART errors are detected). Or could there be another hardware fault? Could a hack be causing a problem? I have dailymail, endpad, tivoweb, cron, mode0 and record via digiguide installed. The only one I have added in the last few months was mode0.

Any suggestions gratefully received!


----------



## bigwold (Jun 4, 2003)

Did anyone ever get to the bottom of this problem? 
I'm having to redo GS every couple of weeks to keep season passes working on an affected TiVo. It appears to be exactly the same problem as greenkr's. One thing that may be a clue is that (on mine at least) GC and indexing dates are only updated at the time of rerunning GS and not after subsequent successful calls/downloads.


----------



## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

I have in the back of my head that people have had problems with indexing not happening, and that it might be due to swap space not being set up right. But I can't put my finger on the details.


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

TCM2007 said:


> I have in the back of my head that people have had problems with indexing not happening, and that it might be due to swap space not being set up right. But I can't put my finger on the details.


Therefore follow the www.steveconrad.co.uk/tivo/upgrade3.html instructions and all should be well.

P.S. I'm glad I didn't buy a hard drive upgrade from bigwold in the days back when he used to do them.


----------



## bigwold (Jun 4, 2003)

So somebody remembers me then!

It is extremely unlikely to be a problem with swap as it's a drive I prepared and it has been fine until a couple of months ago.
Fortunately having several boxes I can experiment a bit.


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

What if you hard reboot and soft reboot the afflicted Tivo. Does the problem still persist then?

Sounds like a Clear and Delete Everything and another Guided Setup might be a last resort if some kind of database corruption is involved? I wonder if this kind of things is the first sign of a hard drive on its last legs?


----------



## bigwold (Jun 4, 2003)

This is for the benefit of anyone else that encounters the problem of their TiVo not indexing in spite of successful daily calls and find the only solution is to rerun GS every few weeks. 

I finally found a cure for this (for me anyway) after I ended up with only one TiVo out of four that was indexing and GCing. The difference between them was that the one working OK was on dialup. The solution is to switch back to dialup and they then index and then switch back to network and they continue as normal. 

I've also found that multiple reboots and/or ftp-ing changed modules to the TiVo seems to trigger the problem. For example, last night I was doing some changes to dailymail_jazz (to display last index and GC date as it happens) which included an accidental reboot and this morning my daily call worked fine but it didn't index afterwards although it had done for the past two weeks. So I switched back to dialup, forced a call and it indexed afterwards.


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

I believe Ljay's original forced daily call script included a command to force Tivo to reindex.

This has been mentioned lately in the Daily Call thread started by ColinYounger.

I wonder if this would help.

Most failures to index and/or make daily calls seem to be down to not properly backgrounding hacks with the & command at the end of each line that calls them in the re.sysinit.author or rc.sysinit.author.edit file on your Tivo.

I have never had this problem with failed indexing in over two years of Tivo daily calling by Cachecard and internet.


----------



## bigwold (Jun 4, 2003)

Pete77 said:


> I believe Ljay's original forced daily call script included a command to force Tivo to reindex.


Not in my copy although our ozzie friends have such a script.



Pete77 said:


> This has been mentioned lately in the Daily Call thread started by ColinYounger.
> I wonder if this would help.


I mentioned the script in that thread because I use LJ's daily_call as I then know at what time indexing should occur which is how I spotted it (or rather the lack of it) so quickly this morning.



Pete77 said:


> Most failures to index and/or make daily calls seem to be down to not properly backgrounding hacks with the & command at the end of each line that calls them in the re.sysinit.author or rc.sysinit.author.edit file on your Tivo.


As you say, 'most', but obviously not all.


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

bigwold perhaps can you tell us why you are no longer a Sedentary member?


----------



## kitschcamp (May 18, 2001)

bigwold said:


> I finally found a cure for this (for me anyway) after I ended up with only one TiVo out of four that was indexing and GCing. The difference between them was that the one working OK was on dialup. The solution is to switch back to dialup and they then index and then switch back to network and they continue as normal.


Another vote up here for that solution - mine had stopped scheduling in this last week. I noticed due to the huge empty slots in HiGuide despite season passes that should have been filling it... Changed to dialup and suddenly the scheduler starts working again.

Now the question is... Is mine and Bigwolds ISP blocking something, or is there something that is only now happening to networked TiVos?


----------



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

kitschcamp said:


> Now the question is... Is mine and Bigwolds ISP blocking something, or is there something that is only now happening to networked TiVos?


Have had my Tivo getting its daily call data by network card for two years so far and have never had the problem with the Daily Call suddenly failing to collect new data.

For that matter I have never had to rerun Guided Setup either and have never had my /var/hack directory cleared, even though I have only had a UPS in place for the last 6 months out of the two years.

Of course I can see that now I have tempted fate........................


----------



## kitschcamp (May 18, 2001)

Pete77 said:


> Have had my Tivo getting its daily call data by network card for two years so far and have never had the problem with the Daily Call suddenly failing to collect new data.


Ah, but that's the insidious nature of this problem, it doesn't stop collecting data - it just fails to schedule programs and process the new data properly... And it happens suddenly with no warning at all, and no visible error messages until you notice programs are not being scheduled anymore.


----------

