# Comcast Cable Card Setup Issues



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

The "Official Comcast" thread is getting fairly long and is more complaining about not getting cable cards, than issues related to install, so I'm starting this one.


I've had my S3 now since Thursday, picked up at Fry's in Renton, WA.

Picked up my first 2 cable cards at local Comcast store on Friday.

Attempted Self-Install Friday evening, got 161-4 errors which at the time I thought were bad.

Swapped out CC's on Saturday morning, attempted another self-install Saturday evening.

Spent 1.5 hours on the phone with a tech trying to get cable cards working.

Everytime they sent their signal, got 161-4 error.

When I went to "test channels" I got the blue hypnotic screen for 10+ minutes and then an error that it could not acquire channel information.

Comcast sent out a tech today who spent 3 hours with me trying various configurations.

Again, everytime the office sent the signal, got the 161-4 error and same blue screen with test channels.

Called TiVo they said to use another cable card device and see if that works. Don't have one and think it's silly to go buy a TV just for testing purposes.

Had tech test signal levels everywhere for channel 2.
At the tap, 18 dB, At my network closet, 15 dB, at the TiVo through my -10 dB attenuator, we're at 7 dB. According to tech any reading between -2 dB and +10 dB should be fine.

Eliminating the splitter and attenuator provided same end result with obviously higher signal levels.

Also, looking at the CableCard setup screens, under conditional access for Auth: it says Unknown. Under Cable Card Status, under State: it says Wait_To_Start

Can anyone that has a WORKING TiVo look at theirs and tell me what their cable card status and Conditional Access readings are? These are Motorola Cable Cards that I have.

ALSO, if anyone had a tech come to their home and look at signal strength and you remember, could you tell me what the signal level was at the TiVo and anywhere else you may have had a reading done?

Sorry for the long post, I just really want this thing to work. I do NOT want to go back to the the Comcast DVR.

Thanks!
John


----------



## sharding (Feb 11, 2001)

I already sent this to you in PM, but for the record in case others are curious, both of my cards say:

Auth: SUBSCRIBED
State: Wait To Start

These are Motorola cable cards. 

I presume that when you're getting the 161-4 error, you're hitting "select" to clear it immediately? That's what I did, for whatever it's worth. I'd think that your signal is probably ok if they were able to get signals out to the Comcast DVR successfully.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

sharding said:


> I'd think that your signal is probably ok if they were able to get signals out to the Comcast DVR successfully.


Well, according to TiVo techs (and Comcast techs for that matter), the CableCards are much more finicky than the STB's, DVR or otherwise. I'm really hoping someone (hopefully someone on Comcast in the Puget Sound) can tell me what their signal levels are. The TiVo tech suggested that either it's the TiVo, OR I just won't be able to use CableCard devices at my home. They actually asked me if the cable company had a cable card STB that we could try. Now why would they have a Cable Card STB? The idea of Cable Cards is to eliminate the STB's right? So he suggested I get another CableCard device and test that. So I guess I run out to Best Buy and get a new TV and try the CableCard in that to see if it works? Great.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

Does anyone know what their signal level readings were when/if a tech came out to the house to do the install? I'm most interested in signal level at the TiVo, but other points along the line, tap, etc. would be helpful in troubleshooting my problems. I still think (hope) it's a Comcast signal level issue and NOT a bad TiVo.

John


----------



## joey398 (Dec 6, 2002)

I was geeky last night and checked mine on my channels. 97 on at least the 5 I checked. Also, my cable line is split near my front door (one to bedroom one to living room). It is split again in the Living room so I can split the signal and watch 50/50 on my Hitachi 51".

FYI using cablevision in westchester new york.


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

I just had 4 cable cards installed and thought I would add some additional info that might be useful

1) Assuming they can get your account provisioned for CableCards (see #2).

Cards were newer Motorola cards with firmware level 4.21 (which I believe is the latest)
You can see that info on the "CableCARD Status" screen. These cards did not need/receive a firmware update during install. (The installer originally had some older Motorola cards with firmware 4.05 on them; I asked if he had others, because I remember reading about problems with that firmware level on the Motorola cards, so I can't say if 4.05 would've worked or not.)

The CableCARD decoder menu came up very quickly after the first card was inserted.

Although the instructions say to complete everything with the first card and then repeat with the second, this really isn't necessary. Just provide whoever is authorizing the cards with the host and data id for each card.

A potential gotcha: it appears that the data in the Conditional Access screen is not updated until "Test Channels" has been accessed for that card, so if you are refreshing that item to see if the card recognized by the cable system, it will look like it isn't. 

The Component PIDs will both be zeros and authorization status will probably say unknown "Auth: unknown". If you see this, and you think the card has been authorized, go to "Test Channels". When you select "Test Channels", you should see a Warning screen that says you are about the access a setting that temporarily disbles recording, with OK and Go back choices. IF YOU DON'T SEE THIS SCREEN, THE CARD PROBABLY ISN'T AUTHORIZED CORRECTLY.

If you don't see the warning screen, you will see a screen with text about getting channel information - primarily a blue screen with a spinning disc in the center. The text on this screen is misleading - it has nothing to do with the channels you receive or those that you might see in your guide - the S3 is trying to read the mappings from the cablecard. This should complete almost instaneously (when the card was properly set up, I never saw this screen).

When you are in the test channels screen, try tuning an channel that you expect to be encrypted (e.g. HBO) or in most case ESPN-HD or INHD. If you can see the channel, your cablecard is probably set up correctly. Verify by going to the Conditional Access screen and seeing if Auth: now says SUBSCRIBED. Don't get fooled - you will be able to see any unencrypted channel if you have the card in, but it's not set up/paired/authorized correctly.
If you go into the CA screen after attempting a Test Channels and the component PIDs are both still all zeros, you aren't set up correctly.

As others have said, you may see a 161-4 error message. I don't recall the text of the message, but it implies that things are not well and is very discouraging when you see it. Don't worry, just hit select. It's actually a good thing, since it's an apparent ack of communication with the head end. You should be able to go to test channels after seeing that, as above. If you see the blue screen with spinning disc, the cable company isn't finished.

I'll post more later with part two and provising info (the vast majority of my appointment was getting Comcast to allow my account to accept the cards at all). They ran into a problem that may impact some that don't have a common digital package. More in a bit.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

jfh3 said:


> The Component PIDs will both be zeros and authorization status will probably say unknown "Auth: unknown". If you see this, and you think the card has been authorized, go to "Test Channels". When you select "Test Channels", you should see a Warning screen that says you are about the access a setting that temporarily disbles recording, with OK and Go back choices. IF YOU DON'T SEE THIS SCREEN, THE CARD PROBABLY ISN'T AUTHORIZED CORRECTLY.
> 
> If you don't see the warning screen, you will see a screen with text about getting channel information - primarily a blue screen with a spinning disc in the center. The text on this screen is misleading - it has nothing to do with the channels you receive or those that you might see in your guide - the S3 is trying to read the mappings from the cablecard. This should complete almost instaneously (when the card was properly set up, I never saw this screen).


I'm on pins and needles waiting for #2! This is AWESOME information and just about exactly what I was hoping for! After Comcast sends their Authorization request I do indeed get the 161-4 error. I get one for each card and press select to bypass it. Then Comcast sends another "hit" to the card and I never get a 161-4 error for that, just take them at their word that it went through.

I then go to the "test channels" screen and it sits on the Blue Screen with the spinning thing forever. I never get the channel bar. Ever.

So please please please post #2.

Thanks so much!


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

jhurlbut said:


> I'm on pins and needles waiting for #2! This is AWESOME information and just about exactly what I was hoping for! After Comcast sends their Authorization request I do indeed get the 161-4 error. I get one for each card and press select to bypass it. Then Comcast sends another "hit" to the card and I never get a 161-4 error for that, just take them at their word that it went through.
> 
> I then go to the "test channels" screen and it sits on the Blue Screen with the spinning thing forever. I never get the channel bar. Ever.


Before I start #2 - if it just sits on the Blue screen, go to the Conditional Access screen - that info should mean something to whoever is doing the authorization at the head end. We had a number of times where the guy on the phone thought he was done, but the card wasn't set up properly on their end, even though the "hit" was sent properly and everything "looked OK".

The installer had a direct line to a Comcast conditional access expert and found that the cards hadn't either been initialized or set up properly - they have to be tied to the head somehow. It made sense to the installer, since he had picked up cards (which appeared to be new) directly from a regional warehouse and not from the normal stock for the location.

I only heard half the conversation and don't know the specifics, but as soon as he fixed that, the regular support folks hit each of the cards again and all was well.

If the cable company thinks everything is OK, see if they can find someone that understands the info on the conditional access screen. Just watching the screens, it's pretty obvious to tell when things are "right" (the key field apparently being "Auth:")

As for the blue, spinning disc screen, I had talked to a Series 3 support person at Tivo to understand what that screen was (see my previous post) and just wish Tivo would put some text on the screen to indicate that it was trying to get channel info FROM THE CABLE CARD. Anyway, from what I was told, you should never see that screen for long, if at all, if the card is authorized properly. If you see the warning screen, the S3 thinks it has a valid cable card in it. If not, it's looking for one.

And now on to #2:

2) Being able to even get to the point where the cards could be authorized.

The biggest problem we had today wasn't the Series 3 or the cablecards or even properly authorizing the cards, but getting the work order set up in the first place.

There was no issue about what was needed - the installer (who I presume was one of the lead field techs, since he always seems to be involved in the tough problems) knew what we needed to get done. He also had some field experience with CableCards in the past. I had spent some time with him last week explaining the Series 3 and he already knew that a number of the folks wouldn't have a clue. (In fact, one guy asked him "Are you sure this is an HDTV?" and he smiled and said just said yes. According to the conditional access expert, there is NOTHING that would (easily) identify the host as a Tivo Series 3 and that most sending the commands to the card(s) wouldn't be able to tell from their side that it's not a TV.

I have a digital package, but not a standard one. One of my S3's replaced a Motorola 6412 Phase III box, which was my primary (and only) cable box and had been working fine with my expected channels, including the HD ones, so what we expected to do was:

1) Remove the Moto DVR as my primary box and replace it with 2 cable cards. This should've removed the DVR charge, but because a digital box is included in the price of the package, the 2 cable cards should've been "free".

2) Add a "new" digital outlet for the second S3 ($6.95/month total, for the "outlet" + 2 cards.

We weren't really worried about what the charges were going to be, because I knew we could get the backoffice stuff fixed later - the key was to get the account set up and get the cards installed. Not unexpectedly, the installer heard multiple opinions on just what this was going to cost over the morning.

The problem is that the pricing wasn't set up properly in the system. We knew that if you could have a package authorized with the Comcast DVR (and their HD "flag"), that you should be able to have the same package with cable cards in lieu of the box. This was the root of most of our problems this morning - they couldn't get the work order entered into the system to tie the cards to my account. Quite a few people tried, but no matter what they did, they got an error. When they finally figured out that there was an error in the system, they changed the digital package to a different service level and then everything to allow the cards on the account worked. So, right now, I have a more expensive package, but Comcast will get it fixed so I won't be paying more for essentially not using their box. But I expect my next cable bill will be interesting, given the number of changes made this morning.

So - since they have to get the work order set up properly before you can do anything with the cablecards - if they can't even get the cards on your account in the first place, see if the problem goes away if you switch to a different digital package. I presume this may only be an issue for Comcast and maybe only in some areas of the country, but the installer clearly realized this is a backend system problem and nothing that should impact the customer.

(We actually had the conditional access guy temporarily authorize one of my cards manually for one of the premium packages, since I couldn't get any of the channels in test channels, even though it was supposed to be on my account. Turns out when they "fixed" the package to complete the work order, the premium channels hadn't been turned back on. Once that was done, the premium channels tuned properly on all 4 cards).

So, we had two major problems - the cards weren't properly initialized for the head end and my account wasn't set up to be able to tie the cards to the account.

We both believe that, had neither of these been an issue, that we probably would've been done in about 20 minutes. The total visit was about 3 hours, but was worth it - the installer got some good contacts and learned a lot about the Series 3 and I learned a lot about how things worked on the backend.

I already volunteered to be his test subject when the M-stream cards are available and he's going to take me up on it.


----------



## SLCMike (Nov 18, 2003)

FWIW, my activation story... Though not as detailed, it may help:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=317349


----------



## Gerhard (Sep 29, 2002)

Ok, so I'm having Comcast CableCARD setup issues...

One of the cards (#2) indicates Auth: MISSING_PROGRAM_REKEY.

The other card, #1, indicates Auth: unknown

In order to see if a reset would help, I perfrom a Tivo reset...

Previously, both CableCARDs had Auth: MISSING_PROGRAM_REKEY.

I called Comcast and that was a useless excersize. The guy I spoke with was basically anti-cable card. ...and his answer to anything was that a tech needed to come out again.

He also told me that the CableCARDs are programmed from the central office AT the central office with the information on which channels you are premitted to view (decrypt). I guess that means that cable cards are flashed with the channels you are allowed to get?

...but that doesn't make alot of sense to me.

Any thoughts?


----------



## SLCMike (Nov 18, 2003)

Gerhard said:


> One of the cards (#2) indicates Auth: MISSING_PROGRAM_REKEY.


This is what my card said when it hadn't been sent the signal required to tell the card what you are authorized to view from Comcast.



> The other card, #1, indicates Auth: unknown


This rings a bell from some earlier trouble I had. If you check your "Conditional Access" on this card and it does not have "Encryption: DES" -- you probably have a poorly configured card. I am not certain, but I get the impression that if you have one messed up card, neither will work properly.



> Previously, both CableCARDs had Auth: MISSING_PROGRAM_REKEY.


Did just your basic cable channels work at this point? Or not at all?



> I called Comcast and that was a useless excersize. The guy I spoke with was basically anti-cable card. ...and his answer to anything was that a tech needed to come out again.


I hate to say it, but I'd just keep calling until you get someone who actually cares about doing their job. Just today I finally got a Comcast CSR who actually took the time to help get the cards working. It took 2 days to find that person unfortunately!



> He also told me that the CableCARDs are programmed from the central office AT the central office with the information on which channels you are premitted to view (decrypt). I guess that means that cable cards are flashed with the channels you are allowed to get?


Definitely not correct. My Comcast CSR sent those signals to my cards during activation.

See my post above yours for my activation story...


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

jfh3 said:


> Before I start #2 - if it just sits on the Blue screen, go to the Conditional Access screen - that info should mean something to whoever is doing the authorization at the head end. We had a number of times where the guy on the phone thought he was done, but the card wasn't set up properly on their end, even though the "hit" was sent properly and everything "looked OK".


So far, I've only had one CSR that gave a rat's patootie. He was kind enough to e-mail me to check in and see how things are going, so I pointed him this way to see if we can't get closer to a resolution. 


jfh3 said:


> The installer had a direct line to a Comcast conditional access expert and found that the cards hadn't either been initialized or set up properly - they have to be tied to the head somehow. It made sense to the installer, since he had picked up cards (which appeared to be new) directly from a regional warehouse and not from the normal stock for the location.
> 
> I only heard half the conversation and don't know the specifics, but as soon as he fixed that, the regular support folks hit each of the cards again and all was well.


So far no one has had a clue what the conditional access screen IS, let alone what it SHOULD say.


jfh3 said:


> If the cable company thinks everything is OK, see if they can find someone that understands the info on the conditional access screen. Just watching the screens, it's pretty obvious to tell when things are "right" (the key field apparently being "Auth:")


So far my "Auth:" says "UNKNOWN". My encryption is DES, so I guess I'm halfway there.


jfh3 said:


> Anyway, from what I was told, you should never see that screen for long, if at all, if the card is authorized properly. If you see the warning screen, the S3 thinks it has a valid cable card in it. If not, it's looking for one.


Well, I see it for 10 minutes or so then it times out. So my cards are obviously not authorized properly.


jfh3 said:


> And now on to #2:
> 
> 2) Being able to even get to the point where the cards could be authorized.


I remember the lady that gave me the cards in the first place had a devil of a time adding them to my account. She had to have her supervisor come over and do it and it sounded like it was hokey at best, the way they added them. So now you've got me wondering if they were added improperly. ????

Hopefully the nice CSR that helped me the other evening will read his hotmail tonight and give me a call for some more troubleshooting.


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

jhurlbut said:


> I remember the lady that gave me the cards in the first place had a devil of a time adding them to my account. She had to have her supervisor come over and do it and it sounded like it was hokey at best, the way they added them. So now you've got me wondering if they were added improperly. ????


From what I understand, the two parts are totally seperate - the access guys can hit the cards all day long, but if they aren't tied to the account properly, they won't work properly, even if the correct cable card command are sent.

My installer knew that, unless the cards were added to my account properly (e.g. the work order for the cable cards was created without error), that we weren't going to be sucessfull.


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

SLCMike said:


> I am not certain, but I get the impression that if you have one messed up card, neither will work properly.


Not true. At one point today, I had one card working fine, while the other didn't.

I presume had we left it that way, the S3 would've worked in single tuner mode.


----------



## SLCMike (Nov 18, 2003)

I should have clarified... By "messed up" I mean totally misconfigured to the point of needing to be returned. That is, if you check your "Conditional Access" on your CC and it does not have "Encryption: DES" -- you probably have a "messed up" card. This is the only major difference that I could discern between the cards that did and didn't work for me. On the cards that didn't work I did in fact attempt swapping CC1 for CC2 and then activating with Comcast to see if perhaps having a dud card in CC1 vs. CC2 would result in at least 1 functional card. It didn't. Thus my assertion! 

Having said that, I could still be totally wrong about this issue. It was just my impression that this was the case!


----------



## sharding (Feb 11, 2001)

Awesome info, jfh3. Thanks for sharing! This seems valuable enough to go in a non-Comcast thread, so people with other cable companies will see it. (Of course, I'm reading all of the Cable Card threads because I'm interested in how it's going; maybe everyone else is doing the same thing).


----------



## teddyk (Oct 14, 2002)

I'm having an issue, and I am not sure if it is a cable card issue...

One channel has no sound. I still have my cable box running through another input on my television and sound is fine through that.


----------



## Gerhard (Sep 29, 2002)

Ok,

Here is the update.

Even though I'm at work, and super busy, I call Comcast.

I got a really nice lady who indicated to me that the guy I spoke with last night was nuts (and probably just lazy).

Comcast absolutely SENDS the proper information to the CableCARDs in order to configured them. THEY DO NOT COME PRECONFIGURED WITH THE CONTENT YOU ARE ALLOW TO ACCESS, THUS REQUIRING YOU TO HAVE A TECH COME OUT WHENEVER YOU CHANGE YOU LINEUP, ETC.

Furthermore, she was able to send a signal to one of the cards and recieve and the ack(knowledgement).

So the cable cards can certainly be accessed for the purpose of uploading viewing content authorization, and then send an ack or and error back.

I got an error on one of the cards, and the "everything is fine" on the other card.

What the cable company can't do is any anvanced troubleshooting that their specialized cable boxes allow them to do.

What I suspect is the problem is:

In the past, if I've had a slitter on the line with two cable boxes, I need to remove one of them while the other is being authorized!

I have no idea how to do this with the Tivo... However, I'm going to start by installing the first card, having them authorize it, then installing the second card, and having them authorize it.

We'll see.

Oh, and both of my cards list DES for EncryptionES.

Gerhard


----------



## robus (Sep 14, 2006)

Helpful Comcast installer came out with 3 cards. Was a little non-plussed by the sight of the TiVo but managed to take it in stride and actually seemed to be excited about giving it a go. (I think it was his first CableCard install to boot! - Apparently Comcast doesn't install many around here).

Anyway first card goes in and after the various numbers are exchanged during the Channel Check TiVo spontaneously reboots. After reboot however CC 1 is working perfectly.

CC 2 goes in, numbers exchanged - but no spontaneous reboot and no Digital channels received - except for INHD1 and 2 and the local HD broadcasts (that are of course sending SD because it's not primetime).

The theory is that they hadn't activated the second "line" on my account for the second digital decoder. I'm giving it 30 mins - (and perhaps a magical TiVo reboot) and we'll see what happens.

No error messages have been displayed during the process.

So I've got 1.5 cable cards going  

Robert.


----------



## robus (Sep 14, 2006)

Well I'm now down to just 1 CableCard - TiVo was thinking the second card was OK and so was scheduling dual recordings - which isn't good as most digital channels on the second CC are blank.

I've got a service call in for someone to come back on Friday.

Generally seems to be major confusion on second card activation - when I called back to this afternoon to say it was still not working - the CSR said "Well it's not be activated for your account yet..." This despite numerous conversations between the installer and base this morning. Unfortunately "activating" the card seems to have made no difference.

My theory is that it's still some Comcast configuration cockup and everything would work fine if they could just get the pieces talking. In otherwords the hardware is fine but the configuration is cocked up.

Robert.


----------



## Gerhard (Sep 29, 2002)

Update: For giggles I called Comcast and had them hit the cards again to activate them. (I also changed my service to the Digital Plus 5 plan.)

That didn't work. The cards still didn't pop up under AUTH: SUBSCRIBED.

On the other hand, I decided to try something:

I went ahead and pulled the second card. Then I pulled the 1st card. I then inserted the 1st card, and asked ComCast to authorize it.

BAM: The first card could now see the digital premium channels.

I inserted the 2nd Card, and had Comcast hit the card (authorize it). They did not get an error, BUT the 2nd card reads Auth: MISSING_PROGRAM_REKEY. 

So I can get 1 card to work, and the other will not.

However, it is clear that the order in which they activate things is important.

I have had a big problem in the past with getting two cable boxes to work on the same physical cable line! Previously, I would have to have them send a signal to one box, disconnect it, connect the other box, and then authorize the other box. I'm wondering if I'm having that problem here.

Gerhard


----------



## aaronw (Apr 13, 2001)

Gerhard said:


> Ok,
> 
> Furthermore, she was able to send a signal to one of the cards and recieve and the ack(knowledgement).
> 
> Gerhard


This doesn't make a lot of sense to me, as I was under the impression that there is no facility in the Series 3 to send any kind of messages back to the headend... but I'm hardly an authority on such matters.


----------



## Gerhard (Sep 29, 2002)

aaronw said:


> This doesn't make a lot of sense to me, as I was under the impression that there is no facility in the Series 3 to send any kind of messages back to the headend... but I'm hardly an authority on such matters.


It makes perfect sense... the CableCARD would have to be able to acknowledge the reciept of commands.

This is very different than two way communication like On-Demand.

The cable company is completely aware when the card reports and error or doesn't.

Earlier, I had them reset the account and change my service. The caused the 1st cable card to be setup properly. Then, when they sent the activation command to it (which premits use of encrypted digital content), the 1st CC started working.

At every attempt they've been able to tell me if the procedure worked or not. That would have to mean that the card communicated with the central office.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

That's weird because every tech I've talked to at Comcast, without exception says they get nothing back from the cards. They send out the command and they can see when the command leaves the system, but beyond that, they have no clue . . . or so they say.


----------



## Aiken (Feb 17, 2003)

Here's something entirely empirical about the branding of the cards:

I got two cards last week from the Redmond, WA office in anticipation of getting my S3. (Little did I know.) They were both Motorola, but had different labels. One was Comcast branded (red/black label), the other was just Motorola (various pastel colors on the label).

Yesterday, after I finally got an S3 locally, the Comcast card (with a lower serial number) would not do premium content, but the plain Motorola (with a higher serial number) would. After much time with a really great guy at tech support, we decided to trade in the one that didn't work for one that looked just like the one that did, which I did today. We'll see tonight.

If you're having trouble and nothing else is helping, ask them for two cards with the highest and most similar serial numbers in the pile and identical labels. You're most likely to get current, good firmware that way. It may be significant that the non-branded cards worked, it may not be. It might just be age. I wouldn't be surprised if the Comcast variant is buggier, since they hate CableCards.


----------



## sharding (Feb 11, 2001)

FWIW, both of my working cable cards have the Motorola label (no Comcast branding in sight).


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

Ditto here, both motorola, both same label, only difference in serial numbers is the last 3 or 4 digits . . . don't know if this means current firmwear or whatnot, but when I picked up my 2nd set thinking the 1st set was bad, the lady said "That's weird, we just got these in yesterday"


----------



## sharding (Feb 11, 2001)

jhurlbut said:


> Ditto here, both motorola, both same label, only difference in serial numbers is the last 3 or 4 digits . . . don't know if this means current firmwear or whatnot, but when I picked up my 2nd set thinking the 1st set was bad, the lady said "That's weird, we just got these in yesterday"


So, what's your next step? Are you still waiting on a callback from Comcast?


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

Aiken said:


> Here's something entirely empirical about the branding of the cards:
> 
> I got two cards last week from the Redmond, WA office in anticipation of getting my S3. (Little did I know.) They were both Motorola, but had different labels. One was Comcast branded (red/black label), the other was just Motorola (various pastel colors on the label).
> 
> ...


The red/black cards are older Motorola cards - they had firmware level 4.05 in them. As soon as I saw that, I asked the installer to use the later level cards (regular Motorola label) which had firmware level 4.21.

It's not that the older cards are necessarily bad, but there have been reports of that firmware level not updating correctly or at all, so I didn't want to even risk it, especially since he brought a whole box of the new cards ...


----------



## IwantHDTivo (Feb 8, 2004)

So, less that three hours ago, I marched proudly from my local Comcast office with two CableCards for my new S3. I thought I had won the war...little did I know it was only the first battle.

I came home and, according to Tivo's direction, inserted the first card into the bottom slot, waited for the information to appear on the screen and called Comcast. Soon after, the CSR informed me he had to send a request to another department to do the auth. He instructed me to wait 15-20 minutes and call back if the card had not been authorized. I do so (apprehensively). 

20 minutes pass and nothing...call back two more times with no avail. When I try to access the Test Channels I get the blue screen for 10-15 minutes before it errors out. Auth status is "unknown", encryption is "DES."

The earliest I can get a truck roll is next Tues! Any suggestions you can provide would be greatly appreciated.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

OK,
After sending numerous e-mails back and forth to the tech I spoke to Saturday (Scott) we decided to go for another install this evening. I inserted card 1 and called Comcast and asked whomever answered to initialize the card. She did and even mentioned that she knew what an S3 was, so we're making progress! I then asked to be transferred to Scott. When Scott came on the line, we tried various configurations and it would be impossible to list them all here. But the basic gist of the whole deal was, Scott stripped my account down to basic bare bones . . . one cable card and phone service (I had to have that to talk to him) and we tried powering down the S3 and trying each of the two cards individually. We tried it WITH the host/data information and WITHOUT the host/data information. I had him compare my account to other user accounts with cable cards, even suggested a couple of people here with S3's that were working to compare it to. As far as Scott could tell, my account was provisioned correctly for the cable cards and everything SHOULD be working.

We did make one small bit of progress . . . instead of ONLY getting the blue screen, occasionally on various configs, we would get the blue screen really quickly THEN the channel bar screen, but instead of providing channel information in the Bar, it said "NO CHANNELS AVAILABLE" and pressing the channel up/down button gave me the "Gong" sound, the only option was to press CLEAR to exit out of the screen. That made me think we were making progress.

Again, we spent well over an hour on the phone and were still unable to get my S3 working. I think my next option is to wait until Fry's has more in stock and swap the box out.

On the Conditional Access Screen, my encryption is always DES.
Sometimes Connected says YES and other times it says NO
AUTH always says Unknown

I'm stumped guys. I can configure a server, a router, a switch, just about anything you can throw at me, I can handle, but this TiVo is kicking my Hurlbut. Any other suggestions?

John


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

jhurlbut said:


> AUTH always says Unknown


This is the key.

Despite what the tech on the other end of the phone thinks, your cards either aren't set up in their system, initalized (e.g. tied to the particular head end) or authorized properly.


----------



## sharding (Feb 11, 2001)

Man, that sucks.

When I talked to Fry's last week, I think they said they'd have more S3s Monday or Tuesday. Have you checked with them? I'm not convinced it's something wrong with the box, but it would be good to eliminate that possibility.


----------



## Gerhard (Sep 29, 2002)

I'm still getting Auth: MISSING_PROGRAM_REKEY with card #2.

I've got Card#1 working... but number 2 isn't.

I wonder if this a program information issue...


----------



## atl Tivo (Apr 14, 2003)

This sounds like a lot of fun. :down: Can't wait to get my cable cards on Oct. 11. So should I make the comcast installer sit there through the entire install. Besides hooking up the Tivo box, Is there anything I can do prior to the Card install to speed up the process.


----------



## sharding (Feb 11, 2001)

atl Tivo said:


> This sounds like a lot of fun. :down: Can't wait to get my cable cards on Oct. 11. So should I make the comcast installer sit there through the entire install. Besides hooking up the Tivo box, Is there anything I can do prior to the Card install to speed up the process.


When it goes smoothly, it shouldn't take long at all. I'd go through guided setup up to the point where it asks for the Cable Cards. I installed mine myself, but the part that the tech would have done (insert the cards, call in to Comcast, make sure it's working) took under 10 minutes.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

I'm not convinced that it is the box either. Scott at Comcast certainly sounds like he knows what he's doing however. How can we be sure (as users) that our accts. are provisioned correctly? What kind of info should we be giving them to ensure our cards are activated and added properly to our accts? Any other suggestions guys? I'm open.


----------



## jkalles (Feb 10, 2003)

Adding to the set up stories:
Got the first card in, called Comcast. Tech was very nice and helpfull, everything went without a hitch until I checked the channels. I wasn't getting my premium or ESPN. He resent the signal and after a few minutes it was all good.
We set up the second card, and in the time he sent the signal for the first card till the 10 minutes it took to send the signal to the second card, 45 other signals were requested. So I have to wait in a virtual line for my signal to come through. I am highly amused at all the signal requests that are hitting Comcast this afternoon.


----------



## jkalles (Feb 10, 2003)

Sure enough, the second signal came through and I am flying along. Fairly painless and easy.


----------



## Gerhard (Sep 29, 2002)

atl Tivo said:


> This sounds like a lot of fun. :down: Can't wait to get my cable cards on Oct. 11. So should I make the comcast installer sit there through the entire install. Besides hooking up the Tivo box, Is there anything I can do prior to the Card install to speed up the process.


Oh, a ComCast installer installed mine too...


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

jfh3 said:


> The red/black cards are older Motorola cards - they had firmware level 4.05 in them. As soon as I saw that, I asked the installer to use the later level cards (regular Motorola label) which had firmware level 4.21.
> 
> It's not that the older cards are necessarily bad, but there have been reports of that firmware level not updating correctly or at all, so I didn't want to even risk it, especially since he brought a whole box of the new cards ...


The installer called me back today - he has done three other local Series 3 installs in the last few days and deliberately tried a Motorola card with 4.05 in one box just to see and it worked fine, so that could be good news for some.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

Here is what I'm seeing on both the Cable Card Status Screens and the Conditional Access Screens:

*Cable Card Status:*
Manufacturer: 0x00 (Motorola)
Version: 04.21
Unit Address: Don't think anyone needs this

Download Status:
Segments Left to Download: 0
State: Wait to Start
Entitlement Management Message

*Conditional Access Screen:*
Unit Address: Same as it was above
Encryption: DES
Connected: no, Enabled by CP: no (NOTE: Sometimes connected is YES)
Auth: unknown
CA Enable: unknown
ECM PID: 0x0000
Component PIDs: 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000
0x0000 0x0000 0x0000
Host Validation: unknown 00
Copy Protection Key: Disabled
CC1: 0x03

*NOTE: This was the cable card in slot 1. Except for Unit address, etc. when inserting a card into slot 2, I get all the same stuff.*


----------



## Roderigo (Mar 12, 2002)

jhurlbut said:


> Connected: no, Enabled by CP: no (NOTE: Sometimes connected is YES)
> [/B]


It's strange that the Connected message would change. The only way this is supposed to change is if the cable company explicitly changes it in the headend.


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

jhurlbut said:


> *Conditional Access Screen:*
> Unit Address: Same as it was above
> Encryption: DES
> Connected: no, Enabled by CP: no (NOTE: Sometimes connected is YES)
> ...


Except for the sometimes connected is yes part, this is the status field for an uninitialized card. Make sure your cable company has it associated with your account and have them try again.


----------



## e-treesh (Nov 27, 2002)

I got my Series 3 working yesterday. 

Bottom Line Up Front:

1) The Comcast account can not have errors.
2) If you change the slots the cards are in it changes the pairing data.
3) You have to have a technician who is not afraid to try something new.

What a struggle. I already had the cable cards when I got my TiVo. I called Comcast hoping to get them activated over the phone. Everything was going smoothly until they found out I was installing them in a TiVo. The lady told me that they did not support TiVo. I finally talked to a supervisor who said there must have been a misunderstanding. She said they would not fix the TiVo if it did not work but they would activate the cards. I was transferred to a technician. When he started referring to my cable card device as a TV I decided not to correct him. After 30 minutes he was unable to activate the cards so he setup an appointment for a technician to come out the next evening. Thats when I got lucky. The technician that showed up was not intimidated by the fact that I wanted to put the cards in a TiVo. He was determined to make it work even when, after having been there a hour, the lady back at the Comcast office told him to leave and to tell me it would not work (she probably didnt know she was on speaker phone). He was here for two hours and exhausted every option he had available. The TiVo tech support guy was great. He stayed on the line the whole two hours. At the end the TiVo tech said the most likely trouble was a problem with my Comcast account. If that was not the case it could be that one or both cable cards were defective. Since the lady back at the Comcast office said the account was OK the Comcast tech said he would come back the next day with four new cards and rule out that possibility. The next day the Comcast tech called to say he had talked to a Comcast engineer and that the engineer had found a problem with my account which he had corrected. He ask me to check and see if the cards where working. They werent. I reminded the tech that we had switched the cards to different slots and the Host ID and Data had changed. He came out to the house and we gave the new pairing information to the people back and the Comcast office. They resent the signal to activate the cards and a few minutes later everything was working.


----------



## robus (Sep 14, 2006)

Well I just had a return visit from a Comcast installer to try and get the second CableCard working and the conclusion is, after another failed effort, their system does not support two cablecards on a single outlet.

I thnk it's utter bull**** and said as much - because the installers and their buddies (that they invariably call to say "Hey - have you ever heard of a TiVo that takes cable cards???" to which the answer is always "No...") seem to barely grasp how CableCard technology works.

Anyway - single tuner S3 for me for the moment - until I get to talk to someone with half a frickin' clue!

Robert.


----------



## southerndoc (Apr 5, 2003)

robus said:


> Well I just had a return visit from a Comcast installer to try and get the second CableCard working and the conclusion is, after another failed effort, their system does not support two cablecards on a single outlet.
> 
> I thnk it's utter bull**** and said as much - because the installers and their buddies (that they invariably call to say "Hey - have you ever heard of a TiVo that takes cable cards???" to which the answer is always "No...") seem to barely grasp how CableCard technology works.
> 
> ...


 Their system should see this as two outlets since the TiVo has unique host ID's for each of the two CableCARD slots. Is he using the unique ID for each slot, or is he using the first ID for both slots?


----------



## robus (Sep 14, 2006)

Unique Host IDs (I think) for both slots - we didn't mess with the first CC because that's working fine. Read of the Host ID and CC ID from the CableCard 2 info screen.

Didn't double check that the host IDs being reported by TiVo are unique - but I'm assuming they are.

Robert.


----------



## sharding (Feb 11, 2001)

Two cable cards on the same "outlet" should look no different at the headend than two cable cards on different outlets in your house. They all connect to the single cable coming in from the street, and become different outlets only through the use of splitters. The TiVo really just has a splitter inside, instead of two inputs forcing you to use the splitter outside. So the argument that two cable cards on one outlet won't work doesn't make any sense (unless they mean from a billing standpoint -- i.e. they can't set your account up with two cable cards without charging you for an additional outlet). This seems like yet another case of the cable company people making it more difficult than it needs to be. Just set it up like the customer has two TVs, except you read both host IDs from one machine...


----------



## robus (Sep 14, 2006)

sharding said:


> This seems like yet another case of the cable company people making it more difficult than it needs to be. Just set it up like the customer has two TVs, except you read both host IDs from one machine...


Yep - I think you're right - they couldn't get it working (due to some screw up in the account database) and rather than figure it out - because they really don't care - they decided to simply give up. Here's the funny thing - the installer went out for a smoke while he was on hold with a CSR. Came back and asked if it was working now - it wasn't - and that's when he went into the spiel about it would never work... but why did he ask if it was working?? That's why I don't trust any of this info.

They did try to create a second outlet - but really they're all so bleeding clueless that I doubt they did it correctly.

One CC working is probably good enough for now... I've had enough grief.

Robert.


----------



## tube013 (Jun 29, 2001)

I'm having difficulty with my cablecard setup. I had them installed yesterday, and they (Comcast - New Castl County, DE) told me everythng worked. I knew and noted to them that I wasn't getting all the channels I was supposed to get. I was told it would take a little while..

A Day later and I'm still in the same place. I called last night and talked to 2 reps, who sent reset or something to the cards and said it went through okay, but nothing changed.

First up.. I sub to regular analog cable (extended basic) + hdtv, when I had my motorola box this meant I got all the channels I would on a normal tuner, plus all the non-premium HD content (INHD, ESPN, TNT, Discovery..... + Locals) So I am under the understanding that I will get the same via the cable cards. with the currnet setup, some channels work (about 1/4 of the locals, and 80%of the analog channels). However it is different on each cable card.

On Cable card 1, I can tune to Comcast Sports Net in HD, and I will get the Cable Card pairing menu flashed up, and then I hit clear, and the channel comes in. On Cable card 2 I get similar behavior on a lot of channels, but the channel never comes up.

My cable cards both were stickered Comcast/Motorola, both are firmware 04.05.

Cable Card 1 under Conditional Access Menu says:
State: Subscribed
Copy Protection Key: Enabled

Cable Card 2 under Conditional Access Menu says:
State: CA Disabled
Copy Protection Key: Disabled

On the phone last night they set up an appointment for Monday, but I'd like to know if anybody has experienced anythign similar, and if so, if it was able to be fixed with out a Tech visit or a card swap.

Luckily my OTA antenna is working awesome with the S3, and I'm able to get all the networks in HD perfectly. (Before I got the cable cards QAM was working great too.. minus the quide data) However I have a mythtv box that could do all of that for over a year, and the whole reason I got the S3 was to get cable card support to get espn etc.


----------



## doctord (Dec 17, 2004)

Tube013,

Your situation sounds very similar to mine although I was getting all of my authorized channels on card #1 and card 2 showed as CA Disabled. I also have the same firmware 4.05 on both cards. Check out my adventure here:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=316310&page=11&pp=309
Post #309

Another possibility is that they only have you activated for 1 outlet.
Good Luck.


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

robus said:


> One CC working is probably good enough for now... I've had enough grief.


You realize that with only one CableCard, you will only be able to use one tuner?

They probably don't have your account set up properly. Get them to fix it.


----------



## beergeek2 (Jan 30, 2002)

FYI -- this thread: *Comcast CC Activation Troubles: What I've learned...
*
Helped the Comcast Analyst I was talking to get things going for me.

After 2 service tech visits and 8 attempts online I was stuck at the

Auth: MISSING_PROGRAM_REKEY

But after reading that thread they figured out what to send to my cable cards.


----------



## rickeame (Jan 3, 2002)

what thread is that? include a link please, I just did a search and found nothing.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

rickeame said:


> what thread is that? include a link please, I just did a search and found nothing.


Here it is, it's the one by SLCMike:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=317349


----------



## bkilian (Jan 8, 2003)

Only issues I had are the normal ones:
Lady on phone: "Our Cablecards won't work in a tivo", Me: "Yes, they will", Her: "How do you know?", Me: "Other people in this area have successfully had them installed" Her: "Oh, hmm.. I need to check with my supervisor" -- Later Her: "Oh, they should work, they just got released, and we haven't got the memo yet"

"I hate these cable card things"

"I'm afraid your card is on someone else's account" Me: "Um, how? I'm holding it right here." Her: Sorry, it's someone else's, can't help you", Cable Tech: "Oh, sorry, I got the serial number wrong, ends with an 8, not a 9", Her, huffily: "Oh, that one's available." (She actually sounded disappointed, considering it took her about 30 minutes of fiddling to get the first one working, I know why. The second one was done in less than 5 minutes.)

In the end, thanks to you guys on this thread (so I know what to look for to make sure it was working), a patient Cable Tech, and the game lady on the phone (She was willing to try things even though she suspected they would not work), we passed the 141-4 or whatever errors, and I have all my channels. I turned down their HD box, and apparently the HD channels are included free with the cable cards, which appear to be free, as far as I can tell, so I save $5 a month. (We'll see)

This is in Renton, WA.

Later in the afternoon, the comcast commercial internet guy came, and ripped out all the work the previous guy had done and rewired it to his exacting specifications, I'm not complaining, he did a good job. I now have 8Mb/1Mb internet I can run servers on, and my Series 3 is amusingly enough getting it's guide data over the same cable it receives it's channels


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

I am about to abandon all hope with Comcast and CableCards.

Thursday they came with one cablecard.
Left, came back an hour later with another one.
They got installed but did not check all channels on cable card 1. 
Only a handful were working.
Came back two hours later with another cablecard. 
We got that working. Things seemed OK for a few days. Then
this morning (Monday) one card is not working on some channels.

Now I get this Error:
Viewing is not permitted using the TiVO Digital Media Records... Try another input."

Tests show that CableCard 1 is working on all channels with a 4.05 firmware card and CableCard 2 is not working on all channels with 4.21 firmware.

I called Comcast and was told. TiVo series are not compatible. I asked why. She said they are imcompatible. I said others have them working. She said there are imcompatibilty issues. Oneday I hope to speak to someone who know something about cablecards.


These things are unreliable.

- Rich


----------



## ThreeSoFar (May 24, 2002)

RichB said:


> I am about to abandon all hope with Comcast and CableCards.
> 
> Thursday they came with one cablecard.
> Left, came back an hour later with another one.
> ...


Not at all. They're easy to use wrong, and that's exactly what the CC's are doing--quite possibly, deliberately.


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

ThreeSoFar said:


> Not at all. They're easy to use wrong, and that's exactly what the CC's are doing--quite possibly, deliberately.


According to the poll on this this thread:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=317247

29% of the people who have tried to get them working said they are not working right. Somewhere in the chain from the technology to the deployment there is a problem. Now that could be Comcast but I series doubt that this is a conspiracy. I cannot imagine that Comcast wants FIOS to be the choice for TiVo users.

- Rich


----------



## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

Interesting. I just added myself to that list... now at 19%. Comcast tried all weekend, six different CableCards, with the same result on one of the two tuners. I've given up. And Tech Support was utterly unwilling to help Comcast work through the problem. That was horrendous. There is such a big difference between the quality of service we get from Customer Service and the quality of service we get from Tech Support, it's pretty shocking.

1 out of 5 failing, and another 1 out of 3 requiring enough work for the respondant to consider it important enough to note.... not good.

----

UPDATED:

I'm utterly mortified. I called TiVo this morning and reversed the lifetime transfer. I came home at lunch to pack the S3 up for its return. And guess what -- all the channels are coming in now (as far as I can tell) on both cards! Argh. Now I'm struggling to get my S3 reactivated!

Is there any way to change my vote in this poll.

I stand behind my concern about the way things are. It shouldn't have been this difficult to get this thing working.


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

bicker said:


> Interesting. I just added myself to that list... now at 19%. Comcast tried all weekend, six different CableCards, with the same result on one of the two tuners. I've given up. And Tech Support was utterly unwilling to help Comcast work through the problem. That was horrendous. There is such a big difference between the quality of service we get from Customer Service and the quality of service we get from Tech Support, it's pretty shocking.
> 
> 1 out of 5 failing, and another 1 out of 3 requiring enough work for the respondant to consider it important enough to note.... not good.


I came up with 29% if you exclude the ones that have not tried  
I am in Stoneham, so we may have the similar experiences?

What kinds of problems are you having?

- Rich


----------



## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

Basically, on one tuner, I was missing the following channels: 26 27 30 31 32 33 34 36 37 40 41 46 65 66 216 257 833 839 846 849 850 851 870

This was despite changing out CableCards several times.


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

bicker said:


> "were" ... You mean what problems was I having -- I'm returning the S3.
> 
> Basically, on one tuner, I was missing the following channels: 26 27 30 31 32 33 34 36 37 40 41 46 65 66 216 257 833 839 846 849 850 851 870
> 
> This was despite changing out CableCards several times.


That is very similar to the problem that I am having on cablecard 2. I have not tried some of those but I am also missing 24 and 62 SciFi. Fortunately, I have an antenna and an HTPC so I have backup. In any case, I will stick with the S3 since it does a great job with the basic stuff, but If I cannot get the cablecards to work, I will just dump digital cable and the cards.

I don't mean to be a bother, but have you checked the revisions of the firmware on the cards using the Settings/...Cablecard menu?

- Rich


----------



## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

I believe that they were 4.21. Does that make sense?


----------



## ThreeSoFar (May 24, 2002)

bicker said:


> "were" ... You mean what problems was I having -- I'm returning the S3.
> 
> Basically, on one tuner, I was missing the following channels: 26 27 30 31 32 33 34 36 37 40 41 46 65 66 216 257 833 839 846 849 850 851 870
> 
> This was despite changing out CableCards several times.


What does the "conditional access" screen say for each card?

That's where the Cable co. sets (is supposed to set) your conditional lineup--pay channels, second tier digital, etc.

It's the Cable company barfing here. Not the cards themselves.

And a company failing 80% of the time? Especially one with exactly that track record? That's not surprising at all...


----------



## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

Both cards showed SUBSCRIBED.

I went in figuring this was Comcast's problem. I came out realizing that the problem was lack of robustness in the design of the Series 3. Maybe robust design was beyond TiVo's capability, for either technical or financial reasons, but it doesn't matter to the 20%-30% (depending on how you count them) of its customers for whom the S3 hasn't worked for digital cable. Also, TiVo did itself no favors by instructing its technical support staff to be rude, condescending and unhelpful. They made it clear to me that they were trying to hide something... very disappointing.


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

bicker said:


> I believe that they were 4.21. Does that make sense?


I don't know. The 4.05 card works for me and the 4.21 does not. I am just looking for patterns.

Thanks,

Rich


----------



## tirofiban (Feb 15, 2003)

RichB said:


> According to the poll on this this thread:
> 
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=317247
> 
> ...


It's not a matter of what Comcast wants. It's a matter of what Comcast decided to spend on training. Their phone reps have no training and can only schedule appointments. I spoke to one service rep yesterday that was so stupid, I had to hangup on her.

Good install, a few days later CC #1 only has broadcast channels and says unsubscribed. So I made a tech appointment. But yesterday, I discovered my upstairs digital cable box also only shows broadcast channels and says I'm not subscribed. I try explaining this to the service rep. I try to make the point the problem is on their end with their computer system and what should be subscribed is messed up. She then suggests I autoscan the channels on my TV!!!!


----------



## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

I'm utterly mortified. I called TiVo this morning and reversed the lifetime transfer. I came home at lunch to pack the S3 up for its return. And guess what -- all the channels are coming in now (as far as I can tell) on both cards! Argh. Now I'm struggling to get my S3 reactivated!


----------



## tirofiban (Feb 15, 2003)

RichB said:


> I don't know. The 4.05 card works for me and the 4.21 does not. I am just looking for patterns.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Rich


On my first install, my tech said the CC w the 4.05 was a brand new model and that the 4.21 was the old model.


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

bicker said:


> I'm utterly mortified. I called TiVo this morning and reversed the lifetime transfer. I came home at lunch to pack the S3 up for its return. And guess what -- all the channels are coming in now (as far as I can tell) on both cards! Argh. Now I'm struggling to get my S3 reactivated!


Good luck, I am glad you are working again.

See what I mean unreliable.

I noticed one other thing. The Pairing Menu for the CC2 (the bad one) also says this:

The card considers the host to have a one way RF capability.

This message is not present on the working card.

- Rich


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

tirofiban said:


> On my first install, my tech said the CC w the 4.05 was a brand new model and that the 4.21 was the old model.


Of course, that is counter-intuitive. I wonder if the tech knew what he/she was talking about?

- Rich


----------



## Gerhard (Sep 29, 2002)

RichB said:


> According to the poll on this this thread:
> 
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=317247
> 
> ...


Rich,

Swap the cable cards and try it again... see if when you swap them if they suddenly start working... I had the same problem you did and suddenly everything started to work just fine.

The issue is 100% your cable vendor. Both the 4.05 & 4.21 cards are known to work.


----------



## tirofiban (Feb 15, 2003)

RichB said:


> Of course, that is counter-intuitive. I wonder if the tech knew what he/she was talking about?
> 
> - Rich


My Comcast tech said they were different model cards. So different models = different firmware release numbers.


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

Gerhard said:


> Rich,
> 
> Swap the cable cards and try it again... see if when you swap them if they suddenly start working... I had the same problem you did and suddenly everything started to work just fine.
> 
> The issue is 100% your cable vendor. Both the 4.05 & 4.21 cards are known to work.


OK. The Tech is coming tomorrow to try new cards.

- Rich


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

And now, a full 24 days into having my S3, I still do not have digital channels on my S3. I can record the local HD channels by manually recording their QAM channel, but anything beyond basic cable is un doable for me. AND because of that, obviously I cannot get the guide data for those channels so all I see when I go to "now playing" is "83-1 Manual Recording 10:00PM" and such. What a PITA!

I have gone through:
8 different Cable cards (all motorola, all firmwear 4.21)
10 - 12 hours on the phone with Comcast trying different setups
4 hours with a tech at my home

I will say that Comcast has been VERY supportive of my efforts and I think they wanted to get it working as much as I did. Sorry if others have had issues with them not supporting, etc. But at least here in the Puget Sound, they've been awesome.

I also placed 2 separate calls to TiVo tech support and was *VERY VERY VERY VERY VERY* disappointed with the service I received from them. Call #1 they told me to go buy a cable card ready TV to test with to determine if it was the TiVo or a Comcast issue. (I'm glad all the CSR's at TiVo have a ton of money to throw around after spending over a grand on an S3)

Call #2 landed me with idiot #2 who was not listening to me at all when I told him I was not getting the channel banner screen, but simply the Blue Screen saying "Acquiring Channel Information". It took me a full 10 minutes to get him to stop reading his f-ing script and listen to what I was saying. He then said he'd forward my case on to the engineers and they would get back to me in a couple days. Well they finally did, and never called me on my cell phone (like I had asked) but simply left a message on my home phone stating that "The problem you're seeing is because your cable cards are not activated, please call your cable company and have them activate your cards" No s***? REALLY? Is that the problem? Why didn't I think of that?

Well, tomorrow, I'm taking the S3 back to Fry's. Taking the 4 current cable cards I have back to Comcast, calling TiVo to cancel my 3 year subscription, and re-hooking up the POS Motorola DVR.

Thanks TiVo for such a great roll out on the S3. I was able to finish the "SameGame" twice though. There is that.

God I wanted this thing to work so badly . . . I guess I got what I wanted. It works . . . badly . . .

John


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

jhurlbut said:


> Well, tomorrow, I'm taking the S3 back to Fry's. Taking the 4 current cable cards I have back to Comcast, calling TiVo to cancel my 3 year subscription, and re-hooking up the POS Motorola DVR.
> 
> Thanks TiVo for such a great roll out on the S3. I was able to finish the "SameGame" twice though. There is that.
> 
> ...


That is really awful. But you know, I think it may be worse if they work for a few days at a time. You just never know if you can rely on it.

My fall back plan is to use my antenna. Is that an option for you?

- Rich


----------



## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

Let me reiterate and expand upon what John said: Comcast - Very polite and very helpful. TiVo Customer Service - Very polite and helpful. TiVo Tech Support - Discourteous and unhelpful. Please please please, someone do something to help Tech Support do a better job!


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

RichB said:


> My fall back plan is to use my antenna. Is that an option for you?


Well, my whole reason for switching to Comcast in the first place was I was moving and I didn't want my DirecTV dish and HD Antenna on the roof anymore on my brand new home. And since DTV was basically dropping support for the TiVo, I thought "How bad can Comcast's HD DVR be anyway?" so I made the switch. If DTV were to go back into a partnership with TiVo and TiVo were to produce an MPEG4 D*TiVo, I'd switch back in a heartbeat. But alas, I'm stuck. I'm stuck in Comcast DVR H - E - Double Hockey Sticks. So the short answer is "no, an antenna is not an option".


----------



## Gerhard (Sep 29, 2002)

Did you guy try sending a message to the Tivo CEO about this?

Gerhard


----------



## baked (Aug 11, 2002)

OK, my Comcast experience went well today. Tech brought 2 cards. First card in Lower Slot never got past the 'Getting Channel Info' stage. Tech had the office ping the card 3 times to no avail. Then he decided to try the 2nd card, swapping it for the first. Office pinged it, and it got past the 'Getting Channel Info' stage quickly, received the 161-4 error, etc. This card immediately worked with all premium and HD channels.

Tech then put Card 1 into Upper Slot and it almost immediately began to work as flawlessly as the other card.

Surprisingly painless. I can hardly believe it.


----------



## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

Did you check to be sure you're getting all the channels you've paid for?


----------



## bkilian (Jan 8, 2003)

jhurlbut said:


> And now, a full 24 days into having my S3, I still do not have digital channels on my S3. I can record the local HD channels by manually recording their QAM channel, but anything beyond basic cable is un doable for me. AND because of that, obviously I cannot get the guide data for those channels so all I see when I go to "now playing" is "83-1 Manual Recording 10:00PM" and such. What a PITA!
> 
> I have gone through:
> 8 different Cable cards (all motorola, all firmwear 4.21)
> ...


Sorry to hear about your bad luck . I'm also in the South King County Comcast area, and my install went flawlessly. Don't worry too much about it though, the comcast rep (when trying to convince me not to go cablecard  ) stated that they'll be rolling out the tivo interface on their own DVR's fairly soon (She said "this quarter", but I'm disinclined to believe). You may get Tivo after all.


----------



## jfh3 (Apr 15, 2004)

bicker said:


> Also, TiVo did itself no favors by instructing its technical support staff to be rude, condescending and unhelpful. They made it clear to me that they were trying to hide something... very disappointing.


LOL! And just why would Tivo do this?

I've read a lot of dumb things here on TCF, but this one has got to be in the top ten.


----------



## ctakim (May 7, 2006)

jhurlbut said:


> And now, a full 24 days into having my S3, I still do not have digital channels on my S3. I can record the local HD channels by manually recording their QAM channel, but anything beyond basic cable is un doable for me. AND because of that, obviously I cannot get the guide data for those channels so all I see when I go to "now playing" is "83-1 Manual Recording 10:00PM" and such. What a PITA!
> 
> I have gone through:
> 8 different Cable cards (all motorola, all firmwear 4.21)
> ...


I'm in the same boat. Returned after 3.5 weeks of failure to get any encrypted channels. Cable company blamed the Series 3, TiVo.com blamed the cable cards. Finally returned the dang thing, but I'm not really happy about it.


----------



## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

jfh3 said:


> LOL! And just why would Tivo do this?


That's really what I'm asking.



> I've read a lot of dumb things here on TCF, but this one has got to be in the top ten.


You're childish and rude. We get it. You don't have to keep throwing your feces around to get attention.


----------



## toots (Feb 24, 2003)

My Comcast visit went surprisingly well.

The tech pinged the first card a couple times before realizing he read one of the numbers wrong. After that, it was pretty smooth sailing.

After all the war stories I've read here, I was expecting more problems. Fortunately, they didn't materialize. In fact, when I made the appointment, the rep said, "Oh, you've got one of those new TiVos. We've done a few of those."

Good thing I waited a week or two before taking the plunge. Gave them a chance to get some practice.


----------



## TexasAg (Apr 2, 2006)

RichB said:


> I noticed one other thing. The Pairing Menu for the CC2 (the bad one) also says this:
> 
> The card considers the host to have a one way RF capability.
> 
> ...


My CableCards have been working fine with Verizon Fios since day 1. Both of my CableCards say "The card considers the host to have a one way RF capability." I believe that is what they are supposed to say.



bicker said:


> You're childish and rude. We get it. You don't have to keep throwing your feces around to get attention.


Can you actually stay involved in any thread without calling someone "childish and rude" (or "rude and childish")?


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

RichB said:


> Good luck, I am glad you are working again.
> 
> See what I mean unreliable.
> 
> ...


I had a break-through last night. I connect the TiVo to a Lumagen HDQ. Apparently the 4.21 card is very finicky and did not like the HDCP response for only some channels. The other card was happy. I powered the scaler up and down and it started to work again.

TiVo Support: Please consider an explanation on the Test Channels screen when nothing is tuned. It would be nice to know if it is an HDCP problem versus a channel authorization problem.

Anyway, I asked them to bring me another 4.05 card the other one is a bit too random for my liking.

- Rich


----------



## RichB (Apr 2, 2003)

TexasAg said:


> My CableCards have been working fine with Verizon Fios since day 1. Both of my CableCards say "The card considers the host to have a one way RF capability." I believe that is what they are supposed to say.


OK. I think that is a red herring. Probably just due to the 4.21 firmware.
I have since determined that the 4.21 card was have fits and deciding that the HDCP pass-through from my Lumagen HDP scaler was unacceptable on some channels only. The other card liked it just fine.

I am still planning on replacing that card.

- Rich


----------



## ah30k (Jan 9, 2006)

bicker said:


> That's really what I'm asking.
> 
> You're childish and rude. We get it. You don't have to keep throwing your feces around to get attention.


Now you've gone and convinced me that you are a total whack job! First you claim that TiVo instructed their CSRs to be rude and unhelpful then when someone calls you on it you respond like this? Whacko!


----------



## FlippedBit (Dec 25, 2001)

I sufferred with the MISSING_PROGRAM_REKEY problem on my second cable card for 1 week. Finally, on my fourth tech visit from seven scheduled visits we got it working. That's right, I sat through three four hour time slots and nobody ever showed. This was also the first visit from a real Comcast tech. The other three visits were from the same contractor. This is what he did:

Pulled out the working cable card from slot one (I had already pulled out the non working card from slot two and restarted the S3)

Put the non-working card that was in slot two into slot one

We waited for the MMI screen (other guy never waited, he always immediately called for the hit, then he flailed on the remote so much I could never keep up with him. If the MMI screen had popped up it would have been one of a blur of screens.)

He called in and asked for a "Initialize, Hit, Refresh" (other guy only ever asked for a hit, said the cards were initialized before he came out) (Also when I called earlier and asked for an initialize myself, they said that they could but wouldn't do this. Customers can only request a hit)

After a while we got the 161-4 error (First time I ever saw this so I was feeling even more optomistic. Again, may have happened befor but tech was flipping through screens and I may have missed it)

AUTH now says SUCCESSFUL and am getting all channels.

Pluged original working card into slot two, after a few minutes it is working also.


----------



## jhurlbut (Sep 1, 2005)

Took the S3 back today. I think I almost cried. I will miss it. But after 24 days and Comcast pointing the finger at TiVo and TiVo pointing the finger at Comcast, I gave up. It's not like Fry's would extend their return policy for me. Nor do I think TiVo would let me cancel my 3 year sub after 30 days either.

Maybe in a month or two, I'll pick up another one and give it another go.

Congrats to all of you that got yours working. Enjoy.

My Motorola DVR is hooked up and recording Boston Legal on Channel 104 as we speak. Not channel 84-1 or some damn thing . . . I'm sure it's only a matter of time before it f-s something up, but hey, whatreya gonna do?

If anyone has any other grand ideas to get it to work in the future, e-mail me.

Thanks for all your help . . .

I miss my S3 already . . .


----------



## kevinfor222 (Nov 14, 2002)

I have had my S3 for about a week.. and I've been having problems getting Premium HD channels HBO-HD, Showtime-HD .. however other encrypted HD channels like Discovery-HD etc (and all other channels are ok) .. I've spent countless hours on the phone with Comcast tried everything in this group etc.. hostID's unit ID etc are all correct.. and linked to my account.. tried multiple outlets in home.. signal strength is excellent.. 

the only strange thing I see under conditional access is copy-protect-key is disabled
Which doesn't seem to match the examples I've seen in the PVR blogs..

Auth: Subscribed
encryption: DES
CA Enable: possible
Host Validation: Valid 03
copy protection key: disabled

at one time the "host validation" said unknown .. this was a result of comcast not entering the host /data info correctly from the cablecard into my acct.. (that's been fixed) I've done the remove the cards.. reboot setup 1 at a time.. re-run guided setup to no avail.. the firmware is 4.21 

I've asked Comcast to send a "Cold Initiate" which my understanding would redownload the entire settings of the card.. and take about 15-20mins.. but even after having the case escalated to "addressability group" they don't seem to want to do this (they make it sound like if they did this it would disable everybody's internet access in my area)

anybody have any other suggestions on why only HBO-HD & Showtime-HD wouldn't be comming in.. (but HBO/Showtime is ok along with other HD channels.. I'm out of ideas...

my final straw is to contact one of the VP's at comcast to look over my case.. but I'm not sure if it would do any good..


----------



## kevinfor222 (Nov 14, 2002)

just for the record... I've resolved the issue..

I have limited cable service, (channels 0 -30 70-99) along with all high def channels HBO-HD, Showtime etc.. so the only channels I don't get are CNN, MSNBC (40-69) or "analog basic cable" 

well for some strange reason the filter on the line they placed to block channels 30-69 ... also blocked all premium High def channels HBOHD, STARZ etc (all local HD were ok) comcast replaced the filter with a differn't model and all my premium HD channels started to show up 

of course the next day my neighbor came over to ask why his internet & TV cable service was no longer working at all.. after comcast was out to fix my problem (the cable installer accidently disconnected my neighbors service while fixing mine .. oh well..  ) they came out again to fix him and all is well..

so if your not able to recieve premium HD channels.. but can recieve local HD ok on your Series-3 this could be the reason why


----------



## Cherylabq (Oct 4, 2006)

I FINALLY got my second TiVo HD Series 3 WORKING. After two TiVos...I kind of see a pattern of why I wasn't getting channels on some of my tuners. It took about four calls this time to finally get someone on the phone who would be patient with my assessment of the situation. So...Here are the SECRETS to hopefully getting your TiVo running:

First, make sure Comcast has matched the cablecards to the correct host IDs. You can pull out the cards yourself and write down the cablecard numbers. Then go into the Messages and Settings menu. Select Account & System Information menu. Then, the CableCARD Decoders menu. Select Configure CableCARD 1 and then CableCARD Menu. Look for the Host ID Screen (the name is different for Multistream and Singlestream Scientific Atlanta cards). Write down the Host ID number for CableCARD 1 (with the number on the card). Do the same for CableCARD 2. The numbers can get screwed up when the Comcast Rep enters them. If this fails to get your channels working...

Make SURE the Hierarchy of your Comcast equipment is listed correctly on your account. I will try to order this in layman's terms from what I wrote down after I convinced my Comcast Rep to check the equipment order:

Comcast Hierarchy

1. HD DVRs must be listed FIRST!!
2. Non HD DVR boxes next
3. HD cable boxes (without a DVR)
4. Digital Converter (which she said were regular cable boxes)
5. Modem (for internet access)
6. Phone service (I think it was an EMTA for those getting Comcast phone service)
7. Cablecards

If you are still missing channels on one or more of your tuners, make sure the TiVo rate is linked to your account (I'm not sure how they do this, I just know not having it messed up my first TiVo HD Series 3).

A working TiVo HD Series 3 rocks!


----------

